MOSUL — The minaret is reborn, the ablution rooms unearthed, the dome spared by the jihadist madness. The effect exercised by the splendors located in the Al-Nuri Mosque building site as one steps inside is magnetizing.
Al-Nuri is not just a place of worship restored to its former glory, but a symbol of rebirth for the city of Mosul and Iraq, bent for years by the obscurantism brought by jihadism. The site is today the largest initiative carried out by UNESCO worldwide, the biggest since the Abu Simel archeological site in Egypt in the 1960s.
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“The project is part of the ‘Revive the spirit of Mosul’ initiative, inaugurated in 2018 and composed of three pillars: heritage, cultural life and education, all three of them towing carriers of the city’s recovery,” explains Maria Rita Acetoso, Senior Project Manager at the UNESCO Office for Iraq.
The ‘Revive the spirit of Mosul’ initiative encompasses numerous building sites, including the iconic Al-Nuri mosque and its minaret, Al-Hadba; the Notre-Dame de l’Heure convent and the Tahera Church; heritage houses, the Aghawat mosque as well as the Al-Ekhlass school in the old town. The first funds for the project — $50.4 million — came from the United Arab Emirates, followed by the European Union with $38.5 million.
900-year history
Since its construction in the second half of the 12th century A.D., Al-Nuri was invested with the title of Grand Mosque of the city of Mosul. It was a pivotal site in the urban life of the old town, and it played a key role in its development.
In 2014, ISIS raised its flag on top of the mosque, and its leader, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, proclaimed the birth of the “new caliphate” inside its prayer hall. The final blow came in 2017, when the terrorists detonated 20 explosive charges inside the prayer hall, as they withdrew from the city in 2017.
Restoring the mosque is not only an architectural challenge, but also a symbol of rebirth. The reconstruction aims to restore the sense of belonging and identity of all Moslawi — meaning North Mesopotamian Arabic, one of the two main varieties of Mesopotamian Arabic — and Mosul as its center of multicultural creativity.
The inhabitants risked their lives by forming a human chain around the site.
The Al-Hadba minaret was built in 1172 A.D. by the Seljuk ruler Nur al-Din as part of the religious complex of the mosque, and was 45 metres high. Its iconic name, which means “hunchback” in Arabic, was only given to it in the 14th century, when the slope of the structure became accentuated.
Over time, while other monuments inside the site underwent reconstruction, the minaret remained untouched. For this reason, the original parts of the medieval complex — a point of historical relevance in the city and a symbol of its cultural value and name (“Mosul” in Arabic means “the linking point”) — were preserved.
The destruction of its main part in 2017 by ISIS was felt as a national tragedy. During the battle to liberate the city, the inhabitants risked their lives by forming a human chain around the site: an act of bravery that prevented the minaret’s complete destruction.
Rebuilding the mosque
During the preparatory work undertaken by UNESCO at the site, an exceptional archaeological discovery occurred: Four new environments dating back to the 12th century A.D. — probably used for ablutions — were identified in August 2021. Once their existence became known, it was time to study the site to make sure that its foundations were solid.
Excavation works began near the prayer hall and, little by little, the workers uncovered the original pavement of the religious site, but they also started noticing gaps underneath that led to an almost completely buried room below the mosque. The discovery was then integrated in the restoration project.
“This will be the only mosque in the whole of Iraq that will have this integration of the archaeological part, which we will make visitable through a route for access during dedicated hours outside religious services,” Acetoso says.
Yamama Salih, an architect who studied at the International Centre for the Study of the Preservation and Restoration of Cultural Property (ICCROM), and Omar Taqa, who coordinates the reconstruction works and performs the particular task of interpreting the meaning this project bears for the inhabitants of Mosul, are among those recruited by UNESCO to work at Al-Nuri. The preparatory phase started in 2018, followed by the active reconstruction phase of the mosque in the summer of 2022.
Taqa and Salih are the ones who open the gates of the site for us, illustrating the progress of the restoration and the challenges they face on a daily basis.
“We faced several difficulties, starting from the reconstruction of parts of the columns respecting the original dimensions, but also on the minaret, as numerous decorations were lost or damaged by the explosion, and redrawing them in their original version was a struggle,” says Salih.
Taqa recounts the numerous criticisms received by the project for the money spent in the reconstruction, which many thought should have been invested to build hospitals and homes. “Yet, today everyone comes to admire the works and encourage us to keep going and finish as soon as possible to bring the mosque back to its splendor and its ancient sense of community,” he says.
Architectural challenges
Various experts in the fields of engineering, archaeology, architecture and geology were involved in the development of the reconstruction project. Rigorous consultation processes with local authorities and interested parts were also put in place over the past three years.
The preparatory phase of the reconstruction involved structural, geological and archaeological studies, while teams of professionals and technicians protected, cleaned and stabilised the remaining unscathed base of the minaret.
Al-Hadba is being rebuilt with bricks, a technique that has not been used since the 16th century. In fact, it was originally built of brick masonry for the most part and stone masonry in the lower base portion. It was also decided to replicate its leaning structure, which represents an extraordinarily complex technical challenge. This peculiar shape, which was a defining feature of the monument, developed over centuries.
A survey of the local population found that 94% wanted the monument to be rebuilt as it was before.
“In terms of procedures, we conducted a series of examinations to understand the construction history, a kind of anamnesis,” Acetoso explains. “UNESCO and the University of Mosul submitted a survey to the local population, and we asked them to choose between two alternatives: Either we rebuild the minaret as it was, or we leave it in ruins to remember what happened; 94% of the population wanted the monument as it was before. The community made this decision.”
All the work was managed through the collaboration between Italian restorers and 10 Iraqi young people they trained and who are graduates of the Academy of Fine Arts at the University of Mosul. “There is a transfer of specific competences, besides the fact that these young people, being from Mosul and having lived under the Islamic State, fill this project with a sense of redemption of great historical and social value,” Acetoso says.
