Rules · Cities · Doors & windows · Plans · Walls
Build as you will on your own land, provided you do your neighbour no harm: open no window, door or roof terrace that looks into his house or court, and do not set your door opposite his across a lane.
The principle of no harm, and no returning of harm, comes from a saying of the Prophet and underlies the whole law of building as the Maliki judges of North Africa and al-Andalus applied it. The harm most often complained of was visual: a new window, a raised roof or a door that exposed the women of a household to strangers. The judges ordered such openings blocked or raised above eye level, and allowed a newcomer to build only in ways that did not overlook what was already there.
The courtyard house is the architectural answer. It turns blank walls to the street, admits the visitor through a bent entrance so that no one can see in from the door, and opens its rooms, windows and garden on an inner court. Repeated house by house, the rule makes the introverted fabric of the Islamic town.
To turn a domed square into a long church, open two of its great arches into semidomes of the same radius, and open the semidomes in turn into smaller exedrae, so that the space expands by stages from the central dome.
Hagia Sophia: central square 31 m; two semidomes of radius ≈ 15.5 m; four exedrae; interior ≈ 31 × 70 m
Where the ground is flat and the water lies deep, raise it from wells by wheels into tanks and channels, and lay the garden out in regular, symmetrical plots round them, with walks, beds of flowers and trees in order.
Orient the prayer hall so that its principal wall, the qibla wall, stands square to the direction of Mecca, and mark the middle of that wall with a niche, the mihrab.
qibla wall ⟂ direction of the Kaaba; mihrab on the axis
Build the congregational mosque as an enclosed courtyard (sahn) with a covered prayer hall (haram) on its qibla side and shaded porticoes (riwaq) on the others.
Make the prayer hall of identical bays of columns and arcades, so that it can be enlarged by adding aisles or bays without changing its character.
hall = n aisles × m bays of one module
Frame an important arch with a rectangular moulding or band rising from its springing, so that the curved opening is set within a square field.
Cite this page Chris Paton, “Do no harm to your neighbour: no overlooking”, The Textbook of Architecture, https://textbookofarchitecture.com/rule/neighbour-privacy. Text, drawings and models licensed under CC BY-NC 4.0.