The Arab Hall inscriptions retold
Find out more about a research project on our tiles collection by Al Manaar Muslim Cultural Heritage Centre, led by Souad Mohamad with the help from the Al Manaar Women’s group.
In Autumn 2019 Souad Mohamad visited Leighton House with the Al Manaar Women’s group from the Al Manaar Muslim Cultural Heritage Centre, as part of a Community Engagement programme supported by the National Heritage Lottery Fund. Souad became interested in the Arabic writings on the tiles and volunteered to translate the writings on them and research the source material to add to the museum’s understanding of the space. This resulted in the following translations of text from the Arab Hall and the Staircase Hall.
To hear Souad discuss her work on the project, listen to Perspectives on the Arab Hall, the museum’s new audio-tour of the space:
My conclusion is that Lord Leighton loved his house very much and wanted to show it to the world, that’s why he chose the tiles that have poems welcoming guests, at the same time he wanted to protect it from the evil eye so he chose the protecting verses of Quran and the other various supplications…’
Good Fortune
This tile panel includes a poem about bringing good fortune to the home that is often found in tiles or painted directly onto the walls of houses in North Africa (with the exception of Morocco), in particular Tunisia.
Bismillah
This panel of six tiles is decorated with the bismillah which is recited before each surah or chapter of the Quran, except the ninth. It is also used by Muslims in various contexts, for example, at the introduction to speeches, and even before the start of a meal.
Shahada
Shahada is an Islamic creed, one of the Five Pillars of Islam, which declares there is no God but God, and Muhammad is his prophet. The supplication on these tiles is slightly different from the usual shahada, as it does not have the ‘I declare’ and it has an extra phrase at the end after ‘Muhammad is the messenger of Allah’.
A’oothu biallah min alshaytan alrajim
The two phrases in this panel are said when reciting the Qur’an. The first part, about warding off the evil spirit, is encouraged but the second, the Bismillah, is obligatory. This is not the only use of these phrases. Muslims recite A’oothu biallah min alshaytan alrajim whenever they feel they have been tempted by the devil. And the Bismillah is used to ask Allah to bless something. These two phrases are repeated daily by Muslims.
This tile panel is one of a pair, the other sitting on the opposite side of the niche. When the tiles were installed in the Arab Hall they were placed in the wrong order making them difficult to read.
These tiles and the similar ones on the opposite wall are the most disorganised tiles out of the whole collection, some of the tiles are missing and some are misplaced. Although we were able to read some words, it was hard to comprehend what the whole phrase means. It was only when one of us spotted that one of the tiles from the opposite wall was swapped with this side. The tiles in the panel on the right although they are misarranged, are actually easy to read, maybe because the phrase is commonly used in daily Arabic. The first two tiles are put in the right order, then the third tile belongs to the other side. The three lower tiles are also not in the correct order.
Souad says:
"My speculation regarding those two groups of tiles is that they come from one artwork, it make sense because Quranic verses must start with Bismillah but this one hasn’t. I think, due to the limited space on the wall, they must have divided them into two groups, and as they wanted them to be symmetrical, they compromised on some of the tiles which led to the meaning of the verse to be distorted. Lastly, those two groups of tiles should swap places because Arabic writing is from right to left so the Bismillah should be on the right and the (2:256) verse should be on the left when you look at them as you enter the Arab Hall."
The First Martyr
This is the first two verses of a poem attributed to Muhammad Jamaluddin al-Makki al-Amili al-Jezzine also known as Shahid Awwal (The First Martyr). The general meaning of the poem is that the owner is asking God to make his life prosperous when living in this house.
The Most Gracious
This is by far the easiest part of the Arabic writing to decipher it is the beginning of a chapter from the Holy Qur’an. The writing is clear, the tiles are in order and there are no missing tiles. The writing consists of the first six verses of chapter 55, the name of the chapter is the first word in the verse (after the Bismillah).