Tomb of Shah Rukn e Alam (Bahauddin Zakaria)

The Tomb of Shah Rukn-e-Alam located in Multan, Pakistan, is the mausoleum of the Sufi saint Sheikh Rukn-ud-Din Abul Fateh. The tomb of Shah Rukn-e-Alam, grandson of Shaikh Bahauddin Zakaria, was built between 1320 and 1324. The Mausoleum of Rukn-e-Alam could possibly be considered the glory of Multan. The mausoleum is a three-tiered structure, quite different from the nearby Shrine of Bahauddin Zakariya and other earlier shrines which rest upon a square-shaped base. It was built by Ghiyath Uddin Tughlaq, the founder of Tughlaq dynasty in India, in the pre-Mughal architectural style. The first tier, 15 meters in diameter, has four-feet thick walls and is supported by small minaret-shaped towers in each of its eight corners that narrow as they rise and surpass the height of the first tier. A second octagon rests upon the first octagon. The whole is surmounted by a hemispherical dome of 58 feet (18 m) external diameter. Besides its religious importance, the mausoleum is also of considerable archaeological value as its dome is reputed to be the second largest in the world, after ‘Gol Gumbad’ of Bijapur (India), which is the largest. The mausoleum is built entirely of red brick, bounded with beams of shisham wood, which have now turned black after so many centuries. The structure is among the most impressive shrines in the subcontinent and attracts thousands of visitors every year.

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