The construction of the Al-Mursi Abou al-‘Abbas Mosque, Alexandria

Abstract

The Sidi el-Mursi Abul-Abbas Mosque in Alexandria is one of Mario Rossi's best and most well-known buildings. Careful study of the working drawings made it possible to develop some important considerations concerning the construction methods imported into Egypt by Italian architects, engineers, contractors, and skilled workers, between the nineteenth and the twentieth centuries. Along with the documents in the family archive and some site photographs, it was possible to investigate Rossi's new methods of organizing the building site and the relationships between design decisions, construction, and the dissemination of technologies. The new contribution made by this paper consists primarily of describing how this particular mosque was built, reconstructing the process by direct observation, and by interpreting Rossi's extremely complex working details, as well as surveying the building itself. The new approach imported into Egypt by Mario Rossi did not break with local tradition, whilst his introduction of reinforced concrete into Awqaf building practice exerted considerable influence and made him chef d'école and teacher for those who came afterwards. He was Chief Architect for the Egyptian Ministry of Awqaf from 1929 until 1954, and his approach to mosque design was an evident typological and stylistic innovation that left its mark on the architectural vocabulary of the time, establishing a new style that became widely adopted in Egypt and spread as far afield as Washington DC, Saudi Arabia, and Iraq. In a perspective of international cooperation to which we are urged by various countries around the Mediterranean, the primary aim of this type of research is to promote knowledge of this recent heritage: a prerequisite for developing effective tools for its enhanced appreciation, preservation, and recovery, for which the obligatory starting point must be the creation of specialised archives and atlases of works.