People have been searching for meaning in Islamic art for centuries. Newly available in paperback, this book explores the iconography of Islamic art, presenting a diverse range of approaches to the subject. Despite this variety, there is an overarching theme: the linking of the interpretation of objects to textual sources. This results in a collection of in-depth studies of motifs as diverse as the peacock, trees, and the figure holding a cup and branch. In addition, new interpretations are presented of other objects, such as an Abuyyid metal basin or Mongol paintings. Textual sources on the...

Less than ten years after the death of the Prophet Muhammad, the new religion of Islam arrived in Egypt with the army of Amr ibn al-As in AD 641. Amr immediately established his capital at al-Fustat, just south of modern Cairo, and there he built Africa's first mosque, one still in regular use today. Since then, governors, caliphs, sultans, amirs, beys, pashas, among others, have built mosques, madrasas, and mausoleums throughout Egypt in a changing sequence of Fatimid, Ayyubid, Mamluk, Ottoman, and modern styles.
In this fully color-illustrated, large-format volume, a leading historian of...