Kaʿba

Categorized as Terms

Kaʿba

Simon O’Meara

Related Terms:

  • Kiswa (robe of the Ka‘ba)
  • Mahmal (decorated camel-borne litter sent on the pilgrimage to Mecca)
  • Qibla (direction of prayer)
  • Tawaf (circumambulation)

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Related Khamseen Videos:

Sabiha Göloğlu, “Touching Mecca & Medina: The Dalā’il al-Khayrāt and Devotional Practices,” Khamseen: Islamic Art History Online, published 28 August 2020.

Richard McGregor, “Hajj Materials and Rites from Egypt,” Khamseen: Islamic Art History Online, published 9 February 2021.

References:

Abdul Ghani, Muhammad Ilyas. The History of Makkah Mukarramah. Translated by Afzal Hoosen Elias. Medina: Al-Rasheed Printers, 2004. 

King, David. “Faces of the Kaaba: It’s a Primitive Observatory, Weather Vane, and Pointer to God.” The Sciences 22, no. 5 (1982): 16–20. 

Al Mojan, Mohammed H. The Honorable Kabah: Architecture and Kiswah. Translated by Ghassan Rimlawi. Mecca: Al-Kawn Center, 2010. 

O’Meara, Simon. The Kaʿba Orientations: Readings in Islam’s Ancient House. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press 2020.

Rubin, Uri. “The Kaʿba: Aspects of its Ritual Functions and Position in Pre-Islamic and Early Islamic Times.” Jerusalem Studies in Arabic and Islam 8 (1986): 97–131.

Wensinck, Arent Jan, and Jacques Jomier. “Kaʿba.” In Encyclopaedia of Islam, Second Edition, edited by P. Bearman, Th. Bianquis, C.E. Bosworth, E. van Donzel, and Heinrichs, 4:317–22. Leiden: Brill, 1954–2005.

Citation:

Simon O’Meara, “Kaʿba,” Khamseen: Islamic Art History Online, published 12 October 2021.

Simon O’Meara is a Reader in Islamic art history at the School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London. He has a methodological interest in using the discourses of Islam to explore Islamic visuality and understand what scholarship can struggle to accommodate or see. His most recent book is entitled The Ka‘ba Orientations: Readings in Islam’s Ancient House (Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 2020).