The Shahbaz Khan Mosque is a historic

Sunni Sunni Islam is the largest branch of Islam and the largest religious denomination in the world. It holds that Muhammad did not appoint any successor and that his closest companion Abu Bakr () rightfully succeeded him as the caliph of the Mu ...

Hanafi The Hanafi school or Hanafism is the oldest and largest Madhhab, school of Islamic jurisprudence out of the four schools within Sunni Islam. It developed from the teachings of the Faqīh, jurist and theologian Abu Hanifa (), who systemised the ...

mosque A mosque ( ), also called a masjid ( ), is a place of worship for Muslims. The term usually refers to a covered building, but can be any place where Salah, Islamic prayers are performed; such as an outdoor courtyard. Originally, mosques were si ...

, located in

Dhaka Dhaka ( or ; , ), List of renamed places in Bangladesh, formerly known as Dacca, is the capital city, capital and list of cities and towns in Bangladesh, largest city of Bangladesh. It is one of the list of largest cities, largest and list o ...

, in the

Dhaka District Dhaka District () is a Districts of Bangladesh, district in central Bangladesh, and is the densest district in the nation. It is a part of the Dhaka Division. Dhaka, the capital of Bangladesh, rests on the eastern banks of the Buriganga River ...

Bangladesh Bangladesh, officially the People's Republic of Bangladesh, is a country in South Asia. It is the List of countries and dependencies by population, eighth-most populous country in the world and among the List of countries and dependencies by ...

. Situated near Mir Jumla’s Gate, the mosque serves as an example of late

Mughal architecture Mughal architecture is the style of architecture developed in the Mughal Empire in the 16th, 17th and 18th centuries throughout the ever-changing extent of their empire in the Indian subcontinent. It developed from the architectural styles of ea ...

Bengal Bengal ( ) is a Historical geography, historical geographical, ethnolinguistic and cultural term referring to a region in the Eastern South Asia, eastern part of the Indian subcontinent at the apex of the Bay of Bengal. The region of Benga ...

, known as the

Shaista Khan Mirza Abu Talib (b. 22 November 1600 – d. 1694), better known as Shaista Khan, was a general and the Subahdar of Mughal Bengal. He was maternal uncle to the Mughal Emperor Aurangzeb, and acted as a key figure during his reign. Shaista Khan ini ...

architectural style.

History

The

and the adjacent

shrine A shrine ( "case or chest for books or papers"; Old French: ''escrin'' "box or case") is a sacred space">-4; we might wonder whether there's a point at which it's appropriate to talk of the beginnings of French, that is, when it wa ...: ''escri ...

were built in 1679, by Hazi Khwaja Shahbaz Khan, an affluent merchant from Dhaka, who was buried in the shrine after his death.

Architecture

The mosque is rectangular and divided into three equal interior sections, each of which is roofed over by an onion dome. The eastern

façade A façade or facade (; ) is generally the front part or exterior of a building. It is a loanword from the French language, French (), which means "frontage" or "face". In architecture, the façade of a building is often the most important asp ...

of the mosque has three arched openings, and the northern and southern façades have single-arched openings leading to the prayer hall. The prayer hall houses three semi-octagonal ''

mihrab ''Mihrab'' (, ', pl. ') is a niche in the wall of a mosque that indicates the ''qibla'', the direction of the Kaaba in Mecca towards which Muslims should face when praying. The wall in which a ''mihrab'' appears is thus the "''qibla'' wall". ...

s'', each aligned with one opening through the eastern façade. The central ''mihrab'' is larger and highly ornamented with Cyprus-filled kanjuras (decorative merlons), ornate arabesque plastic relief on the

spandrel A spandrel is a roughly triangular space, usually found in pairs, between the top of an arch and a rectangular frame, between the tops of two adjacent arches, or one of the four spaces between a circle within a square. They are frequently fil ...

s, a cusped arch, and engaged colonettes standing on bulbous floral bases. At the four corners, there are four ribbed, octagonal turrets, capped with plastered

cupola In architecture, a cupola () is a relatively small, usually dome-like structure on top of a building often crowning a larger roof or dome. Cupolas often serve as a roof lantern to admit light and air or as a lookout. The word derives, via Ital ...

s. In 1950, the Eastern circle of the Pakistan Directorate of Archaeology (DOA) took over the mosque for restoration.

Gallery

Shahbaz Khan Mosque.jpg, Dargah of Shahbaz Khan Shahbaz_Khan_Mosque_20.jpg, alt=, center, The mosque in 2016 Shahbaz_Khan_Mosque_13.jpg, alt=, center, The mosque in 2016

References

External links

* {{Mosques in Bangladesh 17th-century mosques in Bangladesh Hanafi mosques Mosque buildings with domes in Bangladesh Mosque buildings with minarets in Bangladesh Mosques completed in the 1670s Mosques in Dhaka Mughal mosques Religious buildings and structures completed in 1679 Sunni mosques in Bangladesh

History

Architecture

Gallery

See also

References

Further reading

External links