Habibiyeh Seminary, Tun (Ferdows)

🕰️When was it built?

Its exact date is not known, but the school was built at the start of the Safavid era, with 911 or 918 AH (1505 or 1512) given as the year. The building is linked with the name of Mirza Habib, and after damage in the 1968 earthquake it was restored and became a place of learning again.

🏛️What was it built for?

The school was part of a complex called Bagh-e Elmi, a place for study, debate and student life. The cells are set around the courtyard, and a teaching room was used for lessons. The complex also holds a mosque, reached from the entrance vestibule.

👀What you will see

• The entrance iwan, with a pointed vault, is about eight and a half metres high and rises above a brick-paved forecourt.
• The entrance vestibule has bevelled corners that make it octagonal, and the ways to the mosque and the teaching room branch off from it.
• Two fairly deep iwans stand on the north and south sides of the courtyard, with cells and alcoves lined up around them.
• The mosque has a plain plastered mihrab, and the underside of its dome is decorated with plaster karbandi.
• The niches in the mosque walls have pointed tops; see the repeated arches beside the decoration under the dome.

💡Something interesting

The school's costs were paid from the income of endowed land and mills. This link between learning, mills and land shows that the students' lessons and life depended on support from beyond the school walls.