Musalla Complex of Herat

The Musalla Complex of Herat is the ruined remnant of a magnificent religious and educational ensemble built under the Timurid queen Gawhar Shad in the fifteenth century, when Herat was a renowned centre of art and learning. Several tall minarets, leaning and weathered, still rise above the plain, together with the domed mausoleum of the queen, their surfaces bearing traces of once-lavish tilework. War, earthquakes and deliberate demolition reduced the rest. Even in ruin the towers convey the ambition of the Timurid renaissance.