TERMS 2：
■What
is a mausoleum ?
■Functions of a mausoleum
■Elements composing mausoleums
■Tombs of secular rulers
■Dargah and Tombs for
saints
■Connection
with living Muslims
■List
of photo of mausoleums
The
idea of human death and life after death is deeply connected with
religious rituals and architecture. Let's first look at the
Islamic view of life and death.
For Muslims living this life, death comes when an angel of
death is sent by God and extracts the soul from a human body. The
deceased goes into a situation where he/she waits for the final
judgment, and a tomb is such a place for them to wait. Life ends
with an announcement trumpeted by the angel, and the time for
resurrection comes. The deceased rises from the tomb and is drawn
in front of God, accepting the final judgment. Based upon each
person's faith, it is decided wether he/she goes to the heaven or
hell. In afterlife, life in the place chosen for him/her will
continue forever.
Heaven is the residence of those who spent their days
faithfully in this life. It is a place where they spend peaceful
days in a paradise surrounded by fresh greenery and fountains of
water. Even God is visible.
On the other hand, hell is the place for unfaithful people
where they are put to endless torture in a bottomless hole
engulfed in flames.
All humans are the creation of the one
absolute God. However,
angels created from light, and demons created
from fire and flame
stand between humans, created by God from
clay, and God. It is
interesting that these two characters take
various roles in the
process of death, resurrection and afterlife.
Originally in the Koran, it was considered good that upon death people were buried in the ground with facing towards Mecca when he/she died. It was strictly forbidden to decorate tombs or to visit somebody's grave, not to mention building a construction above the tomb stone in the Koran. However, mausoleums, tomb architecture covering grave developed in Islamic world despite the contradictions, and became one of the significant features of Islamic architecture. All Muslim tombs represent merely a temporary residence for the buried deceased until the final judgment is made. However, what is interesting is the fact that for Muslims still living this life, tombs for saints and secular rulers have come to have different functions in Islamic society.
■Elements composing mausoleums
Let's look at the elements composing mausoleum
seen both in tombs for saints and secular
rulers. The deceased are either buried in
the ground or placed in a crypt underground.
On the ground, generally a cenotaph in the
shape of coffin is placed.
The most general shape used to cover it is a dome on a square
plan, i.e. canopy tomb. Its size differs in each case but these
are seen in many areas. In India, apart from the form with a dome
above walls, a 12 pillared construction is often used for tombs.
A style with more stress on monumental elements is an
octagonal tomb with a dome on an octagonal plan. There are not
many cases of this. However, it is worth paying attention to, as
the form is common with "the dome of the rock" haram,
one of the holy places for Islam). It should be noted that
especially in India, octangonal tombs surrounded by corridors,
like the dome of the rock, are seen in Delhi and Sasaram.
Those with higher tower constructions are built on a circular
or polygonal plan, having a conical roof and being called tomb
towers. This form, seeming to aim for the heavens, should be
understood as a form appearing on the course of invasion of
Turkish tribes into the Islamic world in the 11th century. For
some reason, tomb tower architecture did not gain popularity in
India.
To the main body of tomb, rooms for various purpose, corridors
and courtyards were added and some great constructions came to
appear. In India, numerous tombs were constructed and their form
significantly developed. Especially in the Gujarati region,
mausoleum domes were surrounded by corridors and there are some
cases in which there are multiplex corridors. Also, in Mugalid
architecture there appeared tombs with a complex form having
rooms at four sides of the chamber. A fusion of construction and
garden architecture became their theme. In this way, India's
Islamic architecture is a treasure house of mausoleum
architecture.
Mausoleums that entomb secular rulers were often planned by the ruler and their construction begun while he was alive, sometimes his successor would build it right after the predecessor's death. At the time, the main theme was to construct a monumental structure that is intended as a palace for afterlife. Various types of tombs, such as private tombs, family tombs and tombs for royal family etc., appear depending on the region, period and dynasty. It seems that some members of blood relatives tend to be buried in the same mausoleum. Also, a main theme of construction is a permanency of the tomb. Therefore, it is often built with other public buildings such as a mosque or a madrasa. However, secular rulers did not always build mausoleums. An example of this is the simple tomb of Aurangzeb's that has only tomb stone, and there are some cases in which a ruler is entombed inside or nearby a tomb of a saint. In these tombs, it seems that the ritual of visiting tomb was conducted while the ruler's family line continued. However, they were rarely extended or rebuilt; thus the original architectural form is preserved, though in many cases there is no one to maintain the building and the architecture merely remains.
On
the other hand, tombs for saint were often built after a long
time (sometimes a few hundred years) of the death of the saint,
continuing to be rebuilt and extended, and, in many cases, are
still respected by the public today.
Especially in India, many complexes of tombs of saints called
dargah are built and attract public followers. A saint is a
person who has unusual powers and can communicate people's wish
to God. Even after the death, his inspirational power (baraka)
received from God is sent out. Thus, his tomb becomes a subject
of worship and many people, especially women, visit the tomb and
make wishes. Tombs for saints also differ in size, from great and
famous ones fanctioning as the centre of the religious order
(taliqa), to unknown small ones. The public wish to gain baraka
is sent out from deceased saints and sometimes a large graveyard
is constructed surrounding a tomb.
Under the stable Islamic power established in India, Muslim
merchants and scholars visited from the Middle East. Propagation
of Islam to the public in India is said to have been undertaken
by Sufi who belonged to a kind of mysticism, rather than by a
group of scholars called ulama.
As a prominent religious orders that were active in North
India as the centre, Chisti order and Suhrawardi order can be
named. While the former avoided contacting rulers and focused on
enlightenment of the public, the latter actively developed
relationships with rulers. Tombs of saints that entomb shaykh of
these orders are the base of the order and are called dargah.
Other than those for major orders, there
are tombs of saints
that entomb saints in various places in India.
They are called
dargah attracting the faith of the public
and even taking on a
Hinduistic aspect.
■Connection with living Muslims
As mentioned earlier, according to the Koran, a tomb is a place of impurity and it is forbidden to pray there. Nevertheless, at a Muslim graveyard, there is almost always a mosque. Often a mosque is attached to a mausoleum and there are even cases of a grave being dug inside a mosque. Also, visitors continue to come to the tombs of saints, and a holy place sometimes comes to form the town. Tombs of rulers may be built adjacent to public buildings and often have a spacious garden. From these, we can see the close relationship of Muslims with mausoleums. Were graves and tombs in Islamic society really a place where the smell of death hung in the air and which people loath, as in Japan? To the contrary, as death does not mean disappearance in Islam, it seems that tombs should be considered as a kind of open space in Islamic cities where the public exercises the religious freedom of visiting graves.
TERMS TOP /TERMS 1/TERMS 3
Map of the city surveyed
List of photographs by facility
