Maragheh

Maragheh

Maragheh is a town in the Azerbaijan region of northwestern of Iran. It is the second largest city of East Azerbaijan Province. It is located along the Sufi Chai River on the southern slope of Sahand Mountain.

Maragheh is known as the Garden City of Iran and the Iranian capital of astronomy. It is one of the top 10 cities in the country in terms of its rich historical and cultural context, with more than 300 national registered works.

History

Maragheh has been in the pre-Islamic era but it has been flourished since the 12^th to 14^th centuries.

Maragheh is an ancient city which used to have high walls around the city, which are ruined now. Tow stone bridges were built during the reign of Hulaku Khan, who chose Maragheh the capital of the Ilkhanate.

The Gonbad-e-Kaboud Tower (Blue Tower) is a burial towers, (it’s told the mother of Hulaku Khan is buried there), and it is decorated with decorative patterns resembling Penros tiles.

The Maragheh Observatory, which were built during Khaje Nasir-el-Din’s era, is one of the prominent monuments of Maragheh and Iran. It was contained more than four thousand volumes of books, and it was assembled by the greatest Islamic scholars throughout the Islamic world.

Mehr temple

This monument belongs to the Parthian period and is where the worship service was performed. The Mehr Temple is an underground temple and a place of Mehr worship in the southern village of Varuji Maragheh, underground and rocky.