Notable Buildings And Monuments Codexery

Kaaba

Stone building at Islam's holiest mosque, determining prayer direction worldwide.

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At the heart of Islam's holiest site, the Masjid al-Haram in Mecca, Saudi Arabia, stands a stone structure known as the Kaaba.[1] Muslims worldwide regard this building as the Baytullah and orient their prayers toward it as the qibla.[1] The stone construction has a cuboid shape, reaching roughly 15 meters in height, with side dimensions of 12 meters by 10.5 meters.[2]

Geography and history

Islamic tradition holds that the Kaaba underwent multiple reconstructions, with the most notable rebuilding attributed to Ibrahim and his son Ismail.[3] A fire that broke out during the Umayyad siege of Mecca in 683 CE destroyed the earlier building, leading to the construction of the present-day structure.[4] Before the qibla was redirected to the Kaaba, early Muslims oriented their prayers toward Al-Aqsa Mosque in Jerusalem.[5] Around 600 CE, after fire and flood had compromised the Kaaba's stability, Muhammad participated in its reconstruction.[6]

During the second siege of Mecca in 692, stone projectiles were hurled at the Kaaba.[7] Since that reconstruction, the Kaaba has retained the cubic form it possessed during Muhammad's era, with its fundamental shape and structure remaining unchanged.[7]

What the cited sources add

The earliest depiction of the Kaaba seems to have been in the mosaics of the Great Umayyad Mosque of Damascus, though this image does not survive.[8][9] On 15 March 1935, while performing Hajj, King Ibn Saud was attacked by three armed men from Oman who attempted to assassinate him.[10][11] The earliest circulated image of the Kaaba appeared on an illustrated Hajj certificate from 1193.[8][9] According to her, the Roman army was the primary intended recipient for most of these commodities.[12][13]

References

  1. Wikipedia, "Kaaba" (CC BY-SA 4.0), which cites: Butt, "Explosives detectors to be installed at gates of Mecca's Holy Mosque", The Guardian, 15 August 2011; Al-Azraqi, "Akhbar Mecca: History of Mecca", 2003, p. 262; Wensinck Jomier 1978, p. 319 (original not read by us) en.wikipedia.org
  2. Wikipedia, "Kaaba" (CC BY-SA 4.0), which cites: Peterson, "Dictionary of Islamic Architecture", Taylor & Francis, 1996, p. 142 (original not read by us) en.wikipedia.org
  3. Wikipedia, "Kaaba" (CC BY-SA 4.0), which cites: Ayoub, M., "Islam", Oneworld Publications, 2013 (original not read by us) en.wikipedia.org
  4. Wikipedia, "Kaaba" (CC BY-SA 4.0), which cites: Wensinck Jomier 1978, p. 319; Wensinck Jomier 1978, p. 319 (original not read by us) en.wikipedia.org
  5. Wikipedia, "Kaaba" (CC BY-SA 4.0), which cites: Mubarakpuri 1976 (original not read by us) en.wikipedia.org
  6. Wikipedia, "Kaaba" (CC BY-SA 4.0), which cites: Guillaume, "The Life of Muhammad", Oxford University Press, 1955; Mubarakpuri 1976 (original not read by us) en.wikipedia.org
  7. Wikipedia, "Kaaba" (CC BY-SA 4.0), which cites: Ibn Khaldun, "Al-Muqaddimah", Princeton University Press, 1967, p. 253–255 (we also read that source) en.wikipedia.org
  8. Avinoam Shalem, "The City Objectified: Histories of Common Patterns of Pictorial Renditions", Journal of Material Cultures in the Muslim World (2024), doi:10.1163/26666286-12340045. OpenAlex metadata CC0; paper not read. doi.org
  9. Wikipedia, "Kaaba" (CC BY-SA 4.0), which cites: Shalem, "The City Objectified: Histories of Common Patterns of Pictorial Renditions", Journal of Material Cultures in the Muslim World, 2024-02-22, p. 170–187 (we also read that source) en.wikipedia.org
  10. Amin K. Tokumasu, "Cultural Relations between Saudi Arabia and Japan from the Time of King Abdulaziz to the Time of King Fahd", Darah. facts only, no text reused. web.archive.org
  11. Wikipedia, "Kaaba" (CC BY-SA 4.0), which cites: Jerald L. Thompson, "H. St. John Philby, Ibn Saud and Palestine", December 1981; Amin K. Tokumasu, "Cultural Relations between Saudi Arabia and Japan from the Time of King Abdulaziz to the Time of King Fahd", Darah; Halliburton, "Ibn Saud, King of Arabia, Goes out from Mecca to Grant an Interview", The Kansas City Star, 24 June 1935, p. 16; Amin K. Tokumasu, "Cultural Relations between Saudi Arabia and Japan from the Time of King Abdulaziz to the Time of King Fahd", Darah; Halliburton, "Ibn Saud, King of Arabia, Goes out from Mecca to Grant an In en.wikipedia.org
  12. Patricia Crone, "Quraysh and the Roman army: Making sense of the Meccan leather trade", Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies (2007), doi:10.1017/s0041977x0700002x. OpenAlex metadata CC0; paper not read. doi.org
  13. Wikipedia, "Kaaba" (CC BY-SA 4.0), which cites: Crone, "Quraysh and the Roman Army: Making Sense of the Meccan Leather Trade.", Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London, 2007, p. 63–88 (we also read that source) en.wikipedia.org

Each numbered sentence above was checked against the source it cites before publication. Sentences citing Wikipedia adapt text from the English Wikipedia article Kaaba (contributors), used under CC BY-SA 4.0; this entry is available under the same licence. Other sources were used for facts only; no text or images are copied from them.

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Sources

Compiled from Wikipedia and the sources listed below. Text from Wikipedia is available under CC BY-SA 4.0; this entry is adapted from it.

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