ভূমিকা

Shiavault - a Vault of Shia Islamic Books History of Shrines History of the Shrine of Imam Ali Al-Naqi & Imam Hasan Al-Askari, Peace Be Upon Them The modern city of Samarra is situated on the bank of the river Tigris some sixty miles from the city of Baghdad. The city is of outstanding importance because of its two shrines. The golden dome on one shrine was presented by Nasr al-Din Shah and completed under Muzaffar al-Din Shah in the year 1905 A.D.

Beneath the golden dome are four graves, those of Imam Ali Al-Naqi (10th Imam) and his son, Imam Hasan Al-Askari (11th Imam). The other two are of Hakimah Khatoon, the sister of Imam Ali Al-Naqi who has related at length the circumstances of the birth of Imam Al-Mahdi and the fourth grave is of Nargis Khatoon, the mother of Imam Al-Mahdi, peace be upon him. The second shrine marks the place where Imam Al-Mahdi went into concealment.

It has a dome that is distinguished for the soft delicate design that is worked in blue tiles, and beneath it is the Sardab (cellar) where the Imam is said to have disappeared. Visitors may enter this Sardab by a flight of stairs. In the year A.D.

836, after two years experience with factional strife in Baghdad, the Caliph Mu'tasim departed with his Turkish army to Samarra, “Which he founded and made his residence and military camp.” [^1] There eight caliphs lived in the short period of fifty-six years.[^2] The distance of Samarra from Baghdad is sixty miles.

This name, Surra man ra'a (He who sees it, rejoices), is said to have been given by Mu'tasim himself, when, for approximately £2,000, he purchased as a site for his new city a garden that had been developed by a Christian monastery. The Caliph's happy Arabic pun was based on the Aramaic name, Samarra, which was a town in the immediate vicinity from the times before the Arab conquest.

The general district, however, was known as Tirhan.[^3] Thus the site chosen was an attractive garden spot in a fertile valley of the Tigris, and there the Caliph built his new capital, which became known as “the second city of the Caliphs of the Bani Hashim.” A main avenue, with many residences, ran along the river bank. In the garden of the monastery he built his royal palace, known as the Daru'l Amma, and the monastery itself became his treasury.

A Friday Mosque, was built by Mu'tasim very close to the quarter of the city that was set aside for the army. Mustawfi informs us further that “he built a Minaret for the Mosque.