فصلنامه مطالعات شهر ایرانی اسلامی
پیاپی 18 (زمستان 1393)

Cultural and locational characteristics، historical background and social conditions are among the important factors for the distinction of complexes in different cities and countries. The cities of Islamic period are based on traditional values and a reflection of ideas and culture of Islam in all aspects. The reflection of these Islamic ideas and values in the structure of the city، with the thoughts of the western thinkers on the components of urban society is worth reviewing and studying. Considering the fact that Max Weber has enumerated specific features and components for the urban society and believes that in order to consider each social unit as a city، it should have at least five features including: tower and rampart، bazar، independent court enjoying the minimum independent local rules، different forms of associations based on free election of individuals and relative independency and power to administrate the affairs with the agents selected by citizens (bourgeois). Thus، based on the urban components enumerated in the Max Weber’s theory، this research intends to study the structure of Islamic cities and respond to these questions: 1. Has Islamic urban society had the features of urban society noticed by Weber in the course of history? 2. Have the cities of Islamic civilization domain had a social –spatial organization distinguished from the other civilizational domain? In this research، reviewing the different and creditable sources and different on Islamic city، the model and structure noticed by researchers have been identified an a comparison study with the Max Weber’s theory of city has been made. The findings necessary in this research have been collected in documental method. The results of the research show that the Weber’s views on rejecting the interpretation of Islamic city due to lack of components such as guilds and legal and political autonomy in them are an incomplete interpretation. Because studies performed by some of the researches، orientalists and historians on Islamic cities have led to the presentation of some relatively similar models in the literature of Islamic city. The Islamic teachings also state some features of an Islamic city.

Soltaniyeh is among the unique regions in Iran and even in the world which displays the mixture of historical، cultural and natural environment in one place. The historical site of Soltaniyeh as one of the rare remaining monuments from the civilization of The Ilkhanate includes the world heritage of Soltaniyeh dome and other historical and natural elements beside it in particular the historical lawn of Soltaniyeh. In recent decades، the unsuitable urban expansion has created many visual and environmental abnormalities and issues in the historical urban landscape of Soltaniyeh and in some cases، it has endangered some of the historical، natural and cultural capabilities of the works and views. In this article، presenting the results of the research on the improvement of the quality of historical urban landscape of Soltaniyeh، efforts have been made to pay attention to the significance of the role of landscape around the works with world registration as an effective subject in improving the quality of historical urban landscape. On this basis، the methodology is based on field and documents study in particular by using the 2011 Unesco Recommendation in the descriptive-analytic study of a part of the landscape of the historical site of Soltaniyeh. Then with their expansion and adaptation with the historical urban landscape of Soltaniyeh، the human –social activities، environment visual manifestations، quality and oldness of the network of existing roads، farms and their plowing method، irrigation network، historical centers، limit protective areas and also the positions with an ability for space building and establishment of activity as the most basic elements to construct historical urban landscape and the capabilities of this city have been identified. The final result of the research emphasizes that these elements in connection with each other introduce the historical urban landscape in an integrated form and as a type of identity and value. Furthermore، it contains tables and detached maps from the constructing layers of historical urban landscape in the southern domain of Soltaniyeh dome and distance limit of the dome to Molla Hassan Kashi tome which have been extracted based on data analysis and field studies.

Though markets are the dynamic centers of cities، but the sensitivity of spiritual attitudes has caused limitation in the physical manifestation of these spaces and their rate of sociability. This article tries to clarify that what kind of impacts the viewpoint of Islamic spirituality has on the sociability of urban commercial centers. It sees that there are many physical and conceptual differences between contemporary shopping centers and markets of the past. In order to amend and improve these centers، firstly it is necessary to study the traditional markets in the topic of sociability precisely and then the rate of their fulfillment in today’s centers should be studied. The hullaballoo of attractions and emotion resulting from that in today’s shopping centers gets the internal relaxation from human and this is the same reason for reprimanding the market environment by the religious mystics. This research is made with a critical attitude and relying on the free research method and logic reasoning and its goal is to present a model for the design of contemporary commercial spaces with a view to the sociability in Islamic attitude. For this purpose، using the religious texts، first the principles of ruling sociability on these spaces are introduced and then their methods of fulfillment in the past and contemporary cities are studies and compared with the principles related in the world urbanism. Based on the results obtained، these principles may be detached from each other in two parts of negative and positive of which the most important ones are the necessity of avoiding the appearance of the market، minimum definition of the leisure role of market، combination of social –cultural role in market with mosque، ability of the market for celebrating the religious rituals and so on. Though these principles are well observable in traditional cities، but some of them today have been seriously distorted in the plans of urban development and under the impact of world views. However، these conditions are related to the religious ideal state and their fulfillment in the contemporary consuming condition needs to a vast ground paving which in the beginning might face fast opposite reaction.

One of the important standards for the design of religious spaces in particular mosques is to increase the sense of spirituality in prayers with presence in the mosque space. Gender is one of the determining factors in ideality of physical indexes of mosque from the viewpoint of users. This article tries to find a significant relation between gender and architecture of mosques aiming at gaining the satisfaction of all groups who use it in particular promoting their sense of spirituality in the mosque space with the inclusion of women’s mental and physical need in the deign of mosque architecture. According to the hypothesis of the research، today’s mosques have not been designed proportional with some of the physical and mental needs of their users. AT the same time، the physical standards and features of mosques can influence the spirituality sense of the prayers. In the process of hypothesis testing، the library and historical study method was used about the ratio of women and mosques and the field method with question and observation technique and analysis of statistical data and also the measurement of correlation of physical indicators with the spirituality sense in more than 6 mosques throughout Sari city. The findings of the research show that physical factors have a determining role in the general sense of the viewer of nave and spirituality sense of the prayer. That is to say، to the extent that the physical factors are ideal، to the same extent the spirituality sense in nave is greater. Thus، physical factors can have a noticeable impact on the mental sense and rate of pleasure of individual in the space. It is clear that the sense of spirituality in the nave space has a positive and constructive impact on prayers and will materialize the general goal of an individual from arriving into the mosque space.

Behavior studies with the twofold inclusion of architecture and culture physical body have had a specific position in the environmental theories. The main subject of this research is to study and analyze these types of studies in approaching the behavior adjustment with an emphasize on Islamic culture. For this purpose، after sufficient discussion on theoretical framework of research which considers the contemporary tendencies of design in the domain of adjustment of behavior، a model has been put forth for programming in order to include the two items of behavioral realities and behavioral ideals. In order to implement the model and also to gain the precise results، the prayers rooms of the airport have been presented as a case sample. After collecting data in survey form، the data has been analyzed in SPSS software. The research methodology of the present article is based on the qualitative method and logic reasoning. By the way، the document review and library study، forms the base of analysis، description and interpretation of the results in this article. The results from the application of the model on programming the sample case of prayers room in airports terminals showed that the behavioral realities (including the rate of occurrence of behaviors and also the view of the users towards them) can provide a real based for program bargaining that in addition to designer and employers، the general culture (here Islamic culture) also to be strong in that side and its outcome to be presented in form of obligations of design derived from the general culture and behavioral realities.

Yazd city is the place of a number of historical towers of silence remaining from Zoroastrians which indicates an important and long chapter of the ruling religious beliefs and culture in the vast land of Iran before Islam. Though placing the dead people in towers of silence is not made any more، but the followers of Zoroastrian religion still have remained as a religious minority and continue their life besides other religions. The purpose of this research is to study and identify the architecture of tower of silence in the burial rites of Zoroastrians. Pursuing to achieve this goal، the question which is raised is that what functional، ideological and ritual factors have been effective in the design of towers of silence. The research methodology is of the type of descriptive –analytic researches. Considering the historical and cultural values and also the beautiful architecture and their unique location، this article has firstly introduced the Zoroastrians and their faiths and burial in the Zoroastrian religion precisely and then introducing two towers of silence of Maneckji Limji Hushang Hataria and Golestan Banoo، it has dealt with their comparative studies. The results of this article shows that the towers of silence have unique and intact architectural features whose study and identification will lead to the better study and identification of a part of Iranian architecture in particular the burial rites. Also it was specified that the design and construction of towers of silence are based on the beliefs of Zoroastrians on the fate of body and spirit of human after the death. For this very reason، their architecture with the exception some slight differences is in total united and the same.