The Mosque and Mausoleum of Imam al-Layth bin Sa‘ad (Arabic: مسجد ومقام الإمام الليث بن سعد, romanized: Masjid wa-maqām al-Imām al-Layth bin Saʿad) is a small Sunni Islam mosque and mausoleum dedicated to the Muslim jurist Imam Al-Layth bin Sa'ad, located in the southern portion of the City of the Dead (Cairo) of the Dead near to the Mausoleum of Imam al-Shafi'i, in Cairo, Egypt. A shrine was first built in 640 AH (1242/1243 CE), four centuries after the death of Imam al-Layth in 791 CE, and has slowly expanded over time. Today the site functions as a regular mosque and sees a steady stream of visitors and pilgrims who come to pay their respects to Imam al-Layth.
Name The site is named after the Egyptian jurist and imam Imam al-Layth bin Sa‘d whose full title, according to his tombstone, was al-Layth bin Sa’ad bin Abd al-Rahman Abu al-Harith al-Misri the Mufti of the Egyptians. The site appears to have sat unnoticed for four centuries until it was successively patronised by Ayyubid, Mamluk, and Ottoman rulers and began to gain a name and reputation as a pilgrimage site.
History Imam al-Layth died in 175 AH (791/792 CE) and, according to Al-Maqrizi who provides most of the historical information that we have about the first few centuries in the development of the shrine, was buried with a simple gravestone at the far (southern) end of an area called the Pearl Domes, most likely referring to what is called today the Southern Cemetery (or in Arabic [al-qarāfa]). Al-Maqrizi claims that the first person to build some sort of significant structure around the grave was Abu Zayd al-Misri in 640 AH (1242/1243 CE). Unfortunately, no foundation inscription appears to have survived from the 13th century nor is it mentioned in any textual sources. The reason for its construction may be clearer however if historical context is taken into account. Earlier in the Ayyubid period Salah al-Din sanctioned the construction of a mausoleum for Imam Al-Shafi'i under the auspices of the sheikh Najm al-Din al-Khabushani that would be finished in the early 13th century. This architectural project appears to be a special favour to al-Khabushani which he used the opportunity to promote the Ash'ari theological view as much as he sought to quietly purge that of the Isma'ili Fatimid dynasty. In this context, the decision to build a shrine around the Imam al-Layth is based on the Imam's symbolic importance as the founder of an Ash’ari/rationalist school of Islamic law. Based on the hoards of visitors to the shrine of Imam al-Shafi’i nearby the Ayyubid patrons would have assumed that the shrine of Imam al-Layth would also attract pilgrims.
This point of attracting pilgrims would continue to play importance into the Mamluk period where patronage of the site continued under three sultans; Qalawun, Faraj ibn Barquq, and Al-Mu'ayyad Shaykh, leaving the building with the majority of its medieval core that we see today apart from the four marble Ayyubid columns holding up the large dome. Al-Maqrizi's sources of information for the shrine suggests that literature was circulating in the Mamluk period that ascribed importance to the site as a pilgrimage destination. Contemporary to his own lifetime, al-Maqrizi also reports the various activities, for better or for worse, of the pilgrims who frequent the site:يجتمع بهذا القبة في ليلة كلّ سبت جماعة من القرّاء، فيتلون القرآن الكريم تلاوة حسنة حتى يختسموا ختمة كاملة عند السحر، ويقصد المبيت عندهم للتبرّك بقراءة القرآن عدّة من الناس، ثم تفاحش الجمع، وأقبل النساء والأحداث والغوغاء، فصار أمرا منكرا، لا ينصتون لقراءة ولا يتعظون بمواعظ، بل يحدث منهم على القبور ما لا يجوز. ثم زادوا في التعدّي حتى حفروا ما هنالك خارج القبة من القبور، وبنوا مباني اتخذوها مراحيض وسقايات ماءEvery Saturday evening a group of Quran readers gather at the dome chamber to recite the Quran in full late into the night. Some people seek blessings by staying overnight and reading the Quran. Many people behave obscenely, take an interest in the women, the young men, and the general riffraff making the whole thing objectionable. They don't listen to the Quran nor take heed of the sermons but do things at the domes that aren't permissible. Their excesses became more frequent to the extent that they dug around some of the domes and built structures to be used as toilets and water fountains.In the early 18th century there seems to have been a revival of interest in the shrine of Imam al-Layth. In 1726 the Ottoman amir Musa Jurbaji Mirza completed a renovation and decorative programme around the main shrine, and most likely commissioned the small collection of paintings in the smaller shrine of Imam al-Layth's son. Based on the style it is most likely that the amir added the wooden enclosure inlaid with mother of pearl and according to the inscriptions we know that he was the patron of the expansive paintings underneath the canopy of the enclosure, the rim of the dome's square base, and the Quranic inscriptions along the stone wall on the western wall opposite the shrine.
Architecture
Layout What remains of the medieval core of the building appears to be mostly Ayyubid and Mamluk in origin. Entrance to the site is from the north by a large stone portal flanked by two mastabas and a square-cut door. Inside is a long straight room with a high wooden beamed ceiling where today the southern wall has been knocked down to make room for a larger prayer space. The medieval core is made mostly of ashlar.
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