The Abbasid dynasty (750-1517 AD/ 132-93 AH) seized political leadership of the Islamic world from the Umayyad caliphs in the middle of the eighth-century, asserting their position as male descendants of Muhammad through his uncle, al-Abbas, to legitimize their claim to the caliphate.

Whereas Umayyad architecture developed from the Hellenistic and Late Antique tradition of the eastern Mediterranean, Abbasid architecture is marked by a new monumental scale, the use of structural systems composed of massive brick piers and arches, and decoration of brick and carved and molded stucco. Moving the caliphal capital from Syria to Iraq, where they founded the new city of Baghdad, the Abbasids appropriated much of the eastern artistic traditions of the former Sasanian empire into their urban design and architecture. The new capital city of Baghdad was founded near the ancient Sasanian capital of Ctesiphon, and with its symbolically-charged round plan epitomizes the incorporation of eastern models of kingship into a new architectural ethos.

The fusion of eastern traditions with building types established during the Umayyad period is especially evident in Abbasid mosques. Though they continued to utilize the Umayyad rectangular hypostyle plan with arcaded courtyard and covered prayer hall, the Abbasids constructed mosques characterized by their monumental scale and the incorporation of brick construction, stucco ornament, and architectural forms developed in Mesopotamia and regions to the east. The Great Mosque of al-Mutawakkil at Samarra, still the largest mosque in the world, with its fortified appearance, reliance on brick construction, and the spiral minaret (perhaps drawing on the ancient Near Eastern tradition of the ziggurat) axially aligned with the mihrab, exemplifies the Abbasid mosque type. Other surviving Abbasid mosques are the late ninth-century Mosque of Ibn Tulun in Cairo, the Tarik Khane of Damghan, Iran of between 750-89, and the ninth-century Masjid-I-Tarikh in Balkh, Afghanistan.

Abbasid palaces demonstrate the same monumental scale, the use of brick construction, and widespread stucco ornamentation that appear in the mosques. In contrast to the relatively modest and self-contained Umayyad estates, the Abbasid palaces of Samarra (founded 836, abandoned in 892) and the Jawsaq al-Kharqani or Bayt al-Khalifa of c. 836 included military quarters, extensive gardens and recreational spaces, residential courts and richly-decorated ceremonial spaces in sprawling complexes along the Tigris.

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Sources:

Ettinghausen, Richard and Oleg Grabar. 1987. “The Abbasid Tradition: 750-950.” In The Art and Architecture of Islam 650-1250. New Haven: Yale UP, 75-125.

Hoag, John. 1987. “Abbasid Architecture.” In Islamic Architecture. NY: Rizzoli, 23-31.

Lassner, Jacob. 1970. The Topography of Baghdad in the Early Middle Ages. Detroit : Wayne State University Press.