Musafirkhana Palace: the lost architectural treasure: Fid-Bau Portal

Musafirkhana Palace: the lost architectural treasure

Kashef, Mohamad

This study provides an analytical historical and architectural account of the Musafirkhana Palace. The architectural configuration of this palace represented a rare and complete specimen of the upper-middle class homes in Mamluk and Ottoman Cairo (thirteenth to eighteenth centuries). This architectural treasure was burnt to the ground in 1998. The purpose of this study is to develop preliminary guidelines for the potential reconstruction of the Musafirkhana Palace or house. It includes a rich photographic catalogue of the house's different spaces before they were destroyed by fire. The study also contextualises the Musafirkhana within a broader typological framework that encompasses a range of elite and bourgeois houses which developed over several centuries in pre-modern Cairo. The study finally examines the house's concept of space and its relationship to the surrounding urban context. It questions the prevalent religious and climatic arguments that explain the introverted character of the Cairene house. This study argues that the courtyard configuration of the Cairene house was as much the result of cultural and urban form dynamics as religious and social traditions.