The missing bridge: geometry, epistemology, and the ontological status of Marīnid Zillīj

This article challenges the formalist reduction of Islamic geometric ornament to pure structure, arguing that geometric form alone does not determine ontological status. Examining the Marīnid zillīj, it situates geometry within premodern Islamic epistemology not as an autonomous technique, but as an intermediary science bridging physics and metaphysics. Consequently, it proposes a conceptual framework wherein the pattern operates as a noetic device whose intelligibility presupposes geometry while ultimately exceeding it.