A. Look at the picture. Work in pairs. Talk about the picture and ask and answer the following questions.
1 What is this building?
2 Do you have a building like this in your town/village?
3 What do we call it?
4 What is it used for?
B. Read the text and complete the chart given after it.
'Heritage' is what we inherit from the past, live with in the present and then pass on to our children or future generation. Our unique source of life and inspiration is our cultural and natural heritage. When we speak of World Heritage, it indicates places and sites that we inherited from the past and pass on to the future generation of the entire world.
The 'Shat Gambuj Mosque' in Bagerhat is such a heritage. It became a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1985.
Originally, the historic Mosque City was known as' Khalifatabad'. It is situated at die outskirts of Bagerhat town— not very far from the dense mangrove forest of the Sundarbans. Khalifatabad was a Muslim colony. It was founded by the Turkish general, a saint warrior Ulugh Khan Jahan in the 15* century. The infrastructure of the city reveals significant technical skills in many mosques as well as early Islamic monuments. Baked bricks were used for the construction of the buildings. The planning of the city was dominated by the tradition of Islamic architecture and the decorations were a combination of Mughal and Turkish architecture.
Khan Jahan built a network of roads, bridges, public buildings and reservoirs to make the city habitable. There were about 360 mosques in the city. Among them the most remarkable is the multi-domed Shat Gombuj Mosque. The mosque is unique in the sense that it has 60 pillars that support the root with 77 low height domes. The 4 towers at 4 corners have smaller domes at the top as well.
The vast prayer hall has 11 arched doorways on the east and 7 each on the north and south for light and ventilation. It has 7 aisles running along the length of the mosque and 11 deep curves between the slender stone columns. These columns support the curving arches created by the domes. The thickness of the arches is 6 feet and have slightly narrowing hollow and round wall.
The west wall in the interior has 11 'mihrabs' (niche in mosque pointing towards Makkah). These mihrabs are decorated with stonework and terracotta. The floor of the mosque is made of brick.
Besides being used as a prayer hall, Khan Jahan used the mosque as his court too.Today, it is one of the greatest tourist attractions and one of the best architectural beauties of Bangladesh.
Shat Gambuj Mosque
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Information
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Founded by
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When
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Number of domes
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Number of pillars
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Arches
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Thickness of the arches
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Mihrabs
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C. Look at the picture of the Star Mosque in Dhaka. Read the information and write a description of the mosque with the help of the given clues.
Location: Dhaka, Abul Khairat Road
Style: Mughal
Number of domes: 5
Decoration: different sizes of stars on dome and outside wall
Materials used for decoration: chinaware and white cement
Interior of the mosque: mosaic floor, floral tiles on the wall
Built by: Miiza Ghulam Pir- a respectable Zamindar of Dhaka
Time: early 18th century
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