Andalusian culture related to geometry.

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 Hello guys! Geometry is more than a science, during all the history, geometrical figures have been part of many cultures. In Spain, a lot of different societies have influenced what we know nowadays as our country. In 711 st, ancient Spanish civilizations were invaded by the Muslims tropes, since that moment a new era involving architecture, art, religion… started in the country. 

Many examples of Muslim architecture and Muslim art are still between us nowadays, these areas of the culture put geometry as an essential part of it. The Muslim repertoire is based on three decorative elements: epigraphy, vegetation and geometry. 


Geometry is a key concept in Islamic art as it is present in architectural development as a guiding principle. The geometric Arabic designs of art are very varied and different but one of the most popular is the mosaic.

Mosaics are made up by small glazed ceramic pieces of different shapes (usually geometric) and color that create a complex formation. 

The muslim art started creating different simple compositions based on one or two figures and it ended creating complex compositions which rise the geometrical forms. 



The geometric patterns in the Muslim decoration are based on a key element for tessellating the plane: 


  • The linear growth of the compositions which could continue until infinite. The tessellations can be done through polygons which are easier or no polygons are used. The second ones are more complex and require more time to create. 


Here we can see a polygon mosaic example: 






As you can see there are a lot of geometric figures that conform the design of the mosaic, here they some of them selected: 






This kind of activities of figures identification are very useful in order to teach how to identify different polygons in primary education, also it is a very good way to include two disciplines like geometry and history. This identification can be as well done by selecting some mosaic of rea muslin art, for example, the mosaics in La Alhambra like this one:



This image can be used as a resource for finding and selecting different types of figures and take into account how many sides it have in order to classify it. 


Here you can find more information about La Alhambra and its mosaics: 




That is all, thank you so much for reading me. I will see you soon!

References: 

Alhambra y Generalife. (2017). La geometría matemática de los alicatados. Blog del patronato de la Alhambra y Generalife. https://www.alhambra-patronato.es/geometria-matematica-alicatados




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