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Documenting the architectural heritage of the greater Persianate world

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Category: Safavid Monuments

May 26, 2026 goudarzali

The Destruction of a 17th Century Safavid Dome at the Great Mosque of Kufa

June 30, 2024 goudarzali

The Safavid Color Palette of Isfahan

March 5, 2023 goudarzali

The Safavid Color Palette in Madressah Chahar Bagh – Isfahan

March 4, 2023 goudarzali

PHOTO POST: THE ANCIENT TOMB OF KHWAJA RABIE IN KHURASAN

December 25, 2022 goudarzali

PHOTO POST: Sheikh Lutfollah Mosque – The Pinnacle of Safavid Art & Architecture

Who knew climbing a minaret was such a physically excruciating task. It took around 5 minutes of squeezing my body through this narrow spiral staircase, with stair risers each around 60 cm tall. As you went up, the stairs became taller, the walls narrower, and your heads clearance shorter. It was nearly pitch black within the minarets with light only pouring in from several small windows in its body. When the dome of the Al Askari Shrine was brought down in a logistically complex and thoroughly planned terrorist attack in 2006, it was not only the sacred tomb of an Shi'ite Imam that was destroyed. It was the destruction of the last grand Persian masonry dome to have been built before the adoption of western industrial materials and building methods forever changed Persian architecture. The masonry dome was built in 1905 AD, in the same fashion any grand dual shell Safavid dome would have been built in the 17th century. It was a true shame that it was destroyed just 100 years later. The Al Askari dome was the largest masonry built discontinuous double shell Persian dome up until its destruction in 2006. The modern era and its innovations enter Iran - Late Qajar era frescoes at a bathhouse in Mashhad, Iran Gulzari Shohada (Garden of the martyrs) - A portal to another world | Tomb and Garden of Khwaje Rabi | Mashhad, Iran محرم ماهی که خون بر شمشیر پیروز شد In continuation of the previous post, these photos from the past year show the demolition of the Mosque's historic 17th century dome. Until 2026, the Great Mosque of Kufa had two proper masonry historic dual shell Persian domes. One of these was a larger gilded one over the tomb of Muslim ibn Aqeel (the slain envoy of Hussain ibn Ali) and the other a smaller dome covered in tiles of a deep green color over the tomb of Hani ibn Urwa (the 7th century companion of Imam Ali). It is generally agreed they were constructed sometime in the Safavid period between the late 17th and early 18th centuries. Stylistically this lines up with the known construction dates of other Persian domes at the Atabat in Iraq which have similar designs and proportions and are also Safavid era constructions. Clock towers - a distinctly European form introduced during the industrial age, rose unexpectedly alongside the domes and minarets of Iran and Iraq in the late Qajar and Ottoman eras. As the old Eastern Islamic dynasties were increasingly exposed to European infrastructure and engineering, they sought to bring back some of these technologies to their own dominions. Of these were clock towers, these structures combined utilitarian function with architectural monumentality and were typically situated in sites of bustling civilian usage. In Europe this was often in squares and secular spaces, in Iran and Iraq where vast public squares were not a typical part of urban design, they were placed within the grand courtyards of mosques, shrines, and even cathedrals. It is painful to see attacks and destruction of Iran's infrastructure and the slaughter of its civilians by America—but it is hardly surprising.
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© ALI-REZA GOUDARZI, 2026

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