Activities in the Masjed-e Jom‘e, Isfahan

Located in the historic centre of Esfahan, the Masjed-e Jom̒e
(‘Friday Mosque’) can be seen as a stunning illustration of the evolution
of mosque architecture over twelve centuries, starting in 841 CE,
and now is one of the major Iranian sites inscribed on UNESCO World
Heritage List. The Italian restoration activities carried out in Esfahan during the
1970s were planned and organised in collaboration with the Service
for the Restoration and Preservation of the Historical Monuments of
Iran (now Iranian Cultural Handicraft and Tourism Heritage Organisation)
(ICHTHO) and the Istituto Italiano per il Medio ed Estremo
Oriente (IsMEO, afterwards IsIAO). The restoration activities headed
by Arch. Prof. Eugenio Galdieri and the excavation activities headed
by Prof. Umberto Scerrato in the Friday Mosque were aimed in particular
at identifying the earlier constructional phases of the building:
amongst them the Abbasid, Buyid and Saljuq.
Historical circumstances did not allow for long time (1979-1998)
any Italian team to continue working at Esfahan. Only between 1999
and 2002 an Italian IsIAO team, under the invitation of ICHO (now
ICHTHO) and with the direction of the late Prof. U. Scerrato went
back to Esfahan, starting again the work in the Mosque jointly with
the Iranian colleagues. Many years after the end of the actual excavations, a joint Iranian-
Italian Project named ADAMJI (A.rchaeological D.igital
A.rchive M.asjed-e J.om̒e I.sfahan) has been aimed at providing a
gradual transformation of the whole set of original data and information
(written, graphic, photographic etc.) in a digital archive. The Italian/
Iranian Project jointly coordinated and directed from the Iranian
side by Dr. Faribah Saeidi Anaraki and from the Italian side by Prof.
Bruno Genito, started in 2003 and ended in 2010.