Salmiya

For some time, the Gonbad-e Qabud in Maraghah in Western Iran has attracted considerable attention. Maraghah is a small city east of Daryacheh Urumiyeh in the East Azerbaijan province of Iran. It lies about 100 km south of Tabriz close to the southeastern shores of the huge super-salty lake at the southern foot hills of 3700 meters high Kuh-e Sahand. On the other side of the mountain lies the picturesque village of Kandovan, Iran’s Cappadocia [1]. Maraghah is quite famous for its five tomb towers (four are preserved) from the Post-Seljuq and Mongolian periods (12th till early 14th centuries). Gonbad-e Qabud, the Blue Tower (1196/97), has the most elaborated and complex brick pattern which has fascinated and confused generations of explorers and tourists. It represents an octagonal tower with eight panels each crowned by a niche with a pointed, gothic, arch. The brickwork results in highly ornamental net of unglazed ribs interlaced with turquoise blue ribbons unrelated to the pentagonal...

The most significant building in Na’in is certainly its more than 1000-years old Friday mosque, build in 960 CE. Its single minaret without any ornaments has an octagonal ground plan and tapers. It is built on a small hill somewhat outside of the old city’s center. Nearby, a guard will open the doors of a small museum which is part of a Safavid traditional house with a small sunken garden. The mosque itself, one of the oldest in Iran where still Friday prayers take place, is Abbasid/Buyid, as the remains of the Jurjir mosque in Esfahan. Brickwork and carved stucco especially of the mihrab and surrounding bays are superb and well-preserved. There is no iwan , which is in fact a development of the later Seljuq rulers of Iran. The bazaar in the old city is a museum, too. The shops had been closed long time ago when the owners moved to the modern part of the city.

Kuwait’s Arab Times had attracted my attention to Esfahan’s gorgeous Great Mosque in an article in 2003. Unfortunately, I couldn’t find so far a webpage of the article which praised the wonders of Iran’s largest mosque and one of the most significant and finest buildings of the Islamic world. I visited the site the first time at my second trip to Esfahan in late spring of 2004. I took some pictures in the vast courtyard, soaked the peaceful atmosphere there, and watched the few visitors from Iran and elsewhere. I had forgotten about the many details of the article and faintly had read some of the notes in my travel guide. My second visit in late 2007 was driven by scientific interest. I had recently posted (at Freelance ) my rather amateurish studies and thoughts about a suggested ‘conceptual breakthrough’ in Islamic architecture and art in the late 15th century, i.e., quasi-crystalline tessellations, which had led to world-wide attention due to its publication in the Science magazine...