Garden Features in Islamic Gardens - Part 4
Planting and philosophy:
Plants,
Wild-life,
Giving gardens names,
The principle of unity
Plants in Islamic gardens
A very wide variety of plants are used according to local climate. Some particular plants have already been mentioned – for instance how the Italian Cypress is a key tree for Islamic gardens.
Additionally:
- Tulips are specially popular in Turkey.
- Roses, both red and yellow, are specially popular in Iran.
- Tall trees can be very important for drawing down cooling winds in hot weather. In some medresse gardens, tall trees have very strong cooling effects.
Plants will be discussed in more detail later on, concerning plants which suit an Islamic garden in Britain.
Wild-life and Islamic gardens
Miniature paintings from the Mughal era show that birds were an important part of Mughal gardens. Nowadays, in Indian gardens in particular, birds and animals add much liveliness and colour. In gardens like the Taj Mahal’s, birdsong and loud bird calls fill the air. Flights of bright green parakeets fly overhead and striped palm squirrels scurry around. The Samanid Gardens, Bukhara, Uzbekistan are filled with a fantastic twittering from tens of thousands of brown mynah birds. You can see people feeding birds there as a religious practice, accompanied with prayer.
Giving gardens names
Another feature of Islamic gardens is that sometimes they were given poetic names. For instance in the great garden city of Isfahan in Iran, there were gardens with names like: ‘Garden of the Heart’s Ease’, ‘Garden of the Eight Paradises’, ‘Garden of the Mulberries’.
Last but not least: the principle of unity
A really important principle in Islamic gardens is that all elements of a design hold together in a unity. These gardens are not just collections of different garden features. All a garden’s features need to be chosen so as to relate together in a harmonious whole. This is a reflection of Islamic religious principles.
The Alhambra in Granada, Spain is a good example of this. It’s actually difficult to fix your eyes on any one part of its decorations because the patterns draw your eyes off to other parts with which they harmonise. Buildings are designed to harmonise with the reflections they create in mirror-like large pools. There is one courtyard which is partly extremely bare and simple and partly very richly decorated and this contrast brings out the beauty of both parts.
To some extent the rule of symmetry in Islamic gardens will help designers towards this unity. But it also needs an artistic sense and careful artistic thinking.