Iwan

The iwan is a vaulted hall open on one side to a courtyard, an ancient architectural feature going back to pre-Islamic Parthian and Sassanian times. ¹ Yeomans writes that the introverted plan of iwans facing one another across a court derives from Persia. ¹

Teaching took place in the iwans: at the Salihiyya in Cairo (1242) each court had two iwans, on the qibla and north-west sides, with student rooms on the other two; in the northern wing the north-west iwan served the Malikis and the qibla iwan the Shafi'is. ^{1 2} Yeomans notes that the Salihiyya was not the first madrasa to bring the iwan courtyard to Egypt but is the earliest surviving one, with great influence on later Cairene architecture; the asymmetry of its plan comes from reconciling existing public streets with the direction of Mecca. ^{1 2}