The Sayyida Zainab shrine, near Damascus, Syria, is capped by a gold leaf dome atop a building wrapped in interlocking glazed tiles. The aquamarine, gold, amethyst, and brown tiles create geographic tapestries of swirls and intricate flower patterns. It’s a beautiful place of splendor inside and out, where thousands of Shi‘i Muslim pilgrims and visitors worldwide gather, pray, and honor the resting place of Zainab bint ‘Ali, Prophet Muhammad’s granddaughter. The shrine’s roofline is decorated with cobalt blue tiles that repeat the phrase, “Peace be upon you, oh mother of sorrows and hardships” in white Arabic calligraphy—a testament to the trials Zainab endured throughout her life.
When Noor Zaidi, assistant professor of history, visited the shrine on pilgrimage with her family more than 20 years ago, she was mesmerized. The shrine then inspired her graduate research, and now Zaidi is a scholar of the Middle East and South Asia specializing in the history of gender and sectarianism.
Her new book, Traces of Zainab: Ritual, Memory, and Place in Shi’a Islam, is a study of the woman who became a symbol of resistance for Shi‘i Muslims worldwide. Now Zaidi is leading an international interfaith team to preserve, restore, and digitize the shrine’s archives. With the support of Father Columba Stewart of the Hill Museum & Manuscript Library (HMML) in Minnesota, the Holy Spirit University of Kaslik in Lebanon, and the Mourtada family from Damascus, who have been the custodians of the shrine for over 800 years, the world will learn about one of the very few shrines to a woman in Islam and the community that has preserved it with love.
“We are delighted to return to Syria in support of this historic project,” says Stewart, executive director and CEO of HMML, at Saint John’s University—one of the world’s leading organizations funding the preservation and digitization of endangered archives to create open access collections. “Partnering with this historic shrine lies at the very heart of HMML’s mission to preserve and share the world’s handwritten past to inspire a deeper understanding of our present and future.”
Zaidi notes that this is not just about preserving. It’s about teaching students what it takes to be historians, stewards of a past with many missing parts, and to be aware that their work cannot happen in isolation. “There is a story to tell in the construction of this work that also tells us about the discipline of history, at this moment in time,” says Zaidi. “It’s a story of how to teach students to be conscientious scholars: to not just look at newspapers and documents but take into account what’s not being told, what history is being erased, and ask whose voices are not being heard.”
Q: Who is Zainab bint ‘Ali?
A: Zainab bint ‘Ali has meant many things to many people: woman, emblem, whisper in the past, shout in the street. Her presence, body, and words have been central to the construction of a distinct Shi‘i Islamic identity, yet large parts of her life were absent from view.
At six, she witnessed her grandfather Muhammad’s death, the singular political and religious leader of the Muslim community. Her father, ‘Ali, became the fourth successor to the Prophet Muhammad in 656 AD. His followers considered him the first Imam, God’s spiritual representative on earth. Before he was killed five years later, he passed on the leadership to his sons.
In Karbala, present-day Iraq, in 680 AD, Husayn ibn ‘Ali, Zainab’s brother, refused allegiance to Caliph Yazīd ibn Mu‘awiyah, viewing his rule as illegitimate. A battle ensued, and Husayn’s 72 male companions were killed along with his eight sons, nephews, and cousins. Husayn was beheaded. Zainab and the other women witnessed the massacre. After she was taken into captivity and paraded unveiled to Damascus, it is said that she delivered sermons recounting the events at Karbala. Zainab became a symbol of resistance—the few against the many.
For Shi‘i Muslims, the battle at Karbala became central to constructing their distinct identity, collective memory, theological frameworks, devotional practice, and traditions of mourning.
Q: In what ways have local and international communities contributed to keeping the shrine alive?
A: The shrine is a transnational space with people, materials, and ideas moving in and out of it. In the 19th and 20th centuries, many Shi‘i shrines in Iran and Iraq began to take on a similar appearance, usually attributed to Iranian patronage. A lot of money was invested in maintaining these shrines. The mausoleum is surrounded by silver and gold grilles with Zainab’s grave beneath. They were replaced over the centuries through donations. One came from Pakistan in the 1950s, while others came from Iraq and Iran. The gold leaf, some of the tile colors, and the carpets have all come from different countries. However, the Mourtada family was very deliberate in the renovations, using local craftsmen and an Arab Damascene style of tilework to keep the local cultural heritage embedded in the shrine.
Top row: Inside Sayyida Zainab shrine. (Images courtesy of Zaidi) Bottom row: Local craftsmen renovating the shrine. Constructing the golden dome. (Images courtesy of Makam Sayyida Zainab)
Long before the politics of the present, the shrine was part of the shared sacred geography of Damascus. Its history is entwined with the devotion of countless people who have passed through it over centuries. Syrians of many different backgrounds—including Muslims, Christians, and Jews—have visited the shrine over the centuries. Queen Soraya Esfandiary-Bakhtiary of Iran gave funding to build an electrical system, and Sunni Muslim Muhammad Ali, the American professional boxer and activist, also visited the shrine and paid tribute. Their visits helped raise awareness and respect and brought support from outside the Shi’i community.
(l) Former Prime Minister of Pakistan, Benazir Bhutto, at the Sayyida Zainab shrine. (r) Boxer Muhammad Ali at the Shrine of Sayyida Zainab (Images courtesy Makam Sayyida Zainab)
While the shrine’s story can be told through violence, conflict, and upheaval, we chose to tell the story that often gets buried. When Zainab was asked what she thought of her dead brother, she said, “I see nothing but beauty.” We see nothing but beauty. This is the story the project chooses to tell.
Q: How did you gain access to the shrine’s archives?
A: When I first visited for research in 2012, there was almost nobody there. The shrine was under constant threat, and the atmosphere was one of uncertainty. During that visit, I met Hani Mohsen Mourtada, the head custodian, former Syrian Minister of Higher Education, and former president of the University of Damascus. I think he was genuinely surprised that someone was willing to come under those conditions. He gave me access to photographs, legal documents, and virtually everything the shrine held in its archives. We built a close relationship. I interviewed him several times as the project developed. I returned to Syria in 2019 and again in 2021, but he was in Beirut. Sadly, he passed away during the COVID-19 pandemic, and I never had the chance to see him again.
As I neared completion of my manuscript, I needed to revisit the archival materials and get legal permission to use them. After Hani Mohsen’s death, custodianship passed to his son, Sayed Mazen Al-Mourtada. I connected with him, and Mazen agreed to give me access. He explained that he had moved the oldest records to Beirut because he feared they might not survive the war. Although there was widespread looting and destruction when he moved the records, Mazen recovered much of what I needed. There are many major Shi‘i shrines around the world, but not all of them make their archives available in this way or welcome the same level of transparency. That made this project especially meaningful because Mozen was willing to do exactly that.
Manuscripts from the Sayyida Zainab shrine. (Images courtesy of Makam Sayyida Zainab)
For historians, the history we write is so often incomplete and shaped by these absences and losses. Rather than presenting itself as complete, the digital archive will clearly identify documents destroyed through conflict and explain how historical archives are often incomplete collections of surviving materials. Understanding this is crucial for students as they embark on research.
Q: How does your personal journey help students understand the academic and personal skills required to be a historian?
A: History as a discipline is changing. We’re reading documents, translating them, and making meaning from them. Our research process is part of that history. While I was writing the book, my colleagues at UMBC told me that I should be in the story. I wasn’t used to that. The book is divided into three parts: Zainab’s shrine, the Bibi Pak Daman shrine in Lahore, Pakistan; and the al-Rashād prison for women in Iraq. In each section, I invite the reader to take a journey with me. I was so much a part of the process that while I was writing the book, I became part of the story. I learned that if I’m interviewing these women, they are not speaking to a wall—they were speaking to me.
Being a historian is a labor of love. You don’t do things this long unless you care and find them interesting. I have been studying the Shrine of Sayyida Zainab for about 15 years. For much of that time, Syria was caught in civil war and proxy war. The shrine was regularly targeted by jihadist groups such as ISIS and al-Qaeda, and for more than a decade it was extraordinarily difficult to travel in and out of the country, and then the pandemic happened. Many times, I was told to reframe the book or to change the topic. I didn’t give up.
This archive is my way of contributing something meaningful to the people and place that shaped my research. Although I continue to worry about the shrine’s future, preserving these materials offers hope that, should anything happen to it, its history will not disappear. In that sense, preserving the shrine and its documents is about preserving a piece of our common humanity.
