The above diagram is a plan of Mamluk Cairo as it stands in the beginning of the 21st century, compiled from Nicholas Warner's Monument of Historic Cairo .
The above diagram highlights major traffic axis within the city, creating a distinction between pedestrian and automobile traffic. It should be noted that although el Mu'izz street is highlighted as autombile street, automobile access is highly regulated and considered very light to make it more pedestrian friendly.
The next diagram highlights the various building types and uses within the historic city. It should be noted that the diagram is incomplete; it was compiled by limited amount of information that I have, and will be added onto within this thesis year. Purple marks the Relgious use, Green the leisure use, Blue the educational use, Brown the municipal / defense use, and Red marks the commercial use. The uncolored buildings are meant to be residential use at this point.
The above series distuingshes between the various time periods where the buildings were erected. Starting with the Fatimid Period (969-1174), the Ayubbid Period (1174-1257), the Bahri Mamluk period (1257-1392), the Circassin Mamluk period (1392-1517), the Ottoman period (1517-1805), the Mohamed Ali period (1805-1956), and the Post-Revolution period (1956-present). The monuments highlighted in bright blue depicts the Fatimid Period, while the bright orange depicts the Post-Revolution period.
The next two diagrams deal with acoustic space. It was mentioned that Cairo was planned out so that each individual house would be in hearing reach to the mosque's call to prayer. This diagram tests this claim. The small orange dots marks the spot of the minarets within the city, while the large faded yellow circles maps out the threshold of where the call to prayer would be hold, meaning anything outside that circle wont hear the mosque's call to prayer. The diagram was based on a simple physics equation on the intensity of sound: each time the distance is doubled, the intensity level is divided by four. Knowing that any sound made by a human being can not exceed 80dB (without amplification), the outer large circle mark the point where the sound has reached 20dB (audible whisper).
Interestingly enough, there were a few patches of space that are not within audible reach to the call to prayer. At first, I was disapointed that the theory would therefore by false. However, if you look closely to the map, you would notice that the eastern area is a post revolution grid addition to the city, near the southwestern corner is a Mohamed Ali extention (emulating Hausmann's Paris), and the western part of the city includes a number of Synogoges, which leads me to believe that the area was Cairo's Jewish quarters.
The following diagram is similar to the one before, but it focuses more on the intensity of the mosque clusters. Notice how the cluster is intensified arround both the Qalawun / Barquq complex and arround the Rifa'i / Sultan Hassan mosques near the citadel.
1 comment:
From Jackson's Vernacular Lanscape:
“There was a time when the territory of many villages was the countryside where the church bell could be heard –
like the old-fashioned definition of Cockney: someone born within the sound of Bow bells”
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