Archaeological Survey of Shah Esmael I mausoleum in Ardebil

Subject Areas : Islamic Archaeology

Hasan Yousefi ¹ , Mahmoud Tavousi ²

1 - Department of Archaeology, Tarbiat Modares University, Tehran, Iran.
2 - Department of Archaeology, Tarbiat Modares University, Tehran, Iran.

Received: 2023-08-01 Accepted : 2023-08-01 Published : 2004-08-22

Keywords: Safavid, tomb, Shah Ismael I,

Abstract :

Shah Esmael’s mausoleum, the founder of Safavid’s is one of the most beautiful and glorious monuments of Sheikh Safi - ye - din Ardebili shrine in case of architectural designs and decoration styles. The tomb is located between a tower which is the Sheikh’s shrine and the tomb of Muhi-ye-din (Haramkhaneh). It is probably a part that is added to the building (Maosoleum) later. The tomb has a low and short in width dome which is surrounded by a small narrow room that made it hidden up the two other monuments. This mausoleum is the shrine of a man who established the Safavid dynasty, a dynasty that governed the country for about a quarter of a century. The mausoleum of Shah Esmael is one of those heritted monuments that is not well surveyed and unlike other historic works in this monument being described either they are not noticed at all or just a little mentioned. It could explicitly said that eventhough there is a lot of information about this time in the history of Iran, nothing is done about the architecture of this era by the researchers today. The purpose of this article is to survey the mausoleum of Shah Esmael I according to the archaeological views and inspect the monument considering the historic texts to present an exact and  clear date for this building and identify its position in the collection of Safavid architecture monuments in Ardebil.