Alexander’s Prison in City of Yazd; Prison or School?
Alexander’s Prison is an ancient domed structure apparently known by this name as a result of a reference in a poem of Hafez.
Construction of this building was started in 1234 by Zia ad-din Hossein Razi and completed in 1306 by his sons (Maajd ad-din Hasaan and Ssharaf ad-din Ali).
This place is also named as Ziaeeieh school.
Historical Aspect of Alexander’s Prison
Alexander, the Macedonian, in his way to Ray city built a prison with the name of Kesah and during the time, in Sassanid era, Under the command of Yazdgerd I, a city was built in this place with name of Yazdan Gerd. Although there is no proof of crossing Alexander from this region and it has been just quoted by ethnic historians, we can say it was a place for Greek armies because of good situation. It is also based on ethnic historian quotes; this city was a city of Exiled people by Alexander. City of Yazd during the Mozafarian dynasty reached to the climax of education and culture. After that, the city became popular as a city of science.
Architectural Aspect of Alexander’s Prison
Architecture of this place is unique and it shows the art of architectures of the designers. It seems that this place is only made of adobe. Dome of the school is decorated with the color of light blue and golden.
Unfortunately, after passing 8 centuries, just some little parts of decoration with color is remained. The dome is also composed of 4 porches with the height of 8.8 meters.
Yard of this place is surrounded by 3 porches. One of the interesting part of this school is a hole with the depth of 2.5 meters. At the end of this pit, there is a chamber with 38 stairs and in the middle of the chamber, there is a small pool and the pool was for preparing water for school’s residents.
There are some beliefs saying about the hole in the middle of yard that it was an Alexander’s dungeon but in reality it was a crumple of earth made the hole. After Islamic revolution, Sir Akhund Khorrami rebuilt this place with bricks.
Location
This school is located in Imam street and in Fahadan region near Davazdah Imam Memorial, Heidarzadeh’s Museum of Coin and Anthropology.
How to get there?
You can get there by a car, taxi and bus.
[icon name=”map-marker” class=”” unprefixed_class=””] Address: Yazd, Imam Street, Fahadan region, Alexander’s Prison
