Before the Seljuk period it is likely that most madrasas were in fact private houses (Hillenbrand 1994, 206) and as such will not be distinguished by their plan form. From the Seljuk period, the main landscape visible in the imagery, however, we have a few examples that suggest that, like mosques, madrasas often had large ranges of buildings surrounding substantial courtyards (Hillenbrand 1994, 173-251). Given this basic form, it is likely to be very difficult to distinguish a madrasa from a mosque simply on the basis of the ground plan observed on an aerial image. The scale of the courtyard might be a distinguishing feature, but only in differentiating them from domestic buildings, not from other communal building complexes such as neighbourhood mosques or caravanserais. The early madrasas from our region might perhaps have had buildings of roughly equal size arranged around the courtyard (Hillenbrand 1994, figs 4.1 to 4.10), which might distinguish them from a mosque, if we assume that the latter would have had a larger (prayer hall) structure on one side of the courtyard than the arrangements on the other three sides, although this is a fairly fragile argument for distinguishing between the two.
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Last updated: Mon Sept 29 2008