Mosque and shrine, Bagerhat
Reza Khoda Mosqueরেজা খোদা মসজিদ
- Time needed
- Fifteen minutes.
- best months
- Nov–Feb
- Cost
- Free.
The ruin of a six-domed mosque near the saint's tomb: octagonal corner towers, a great central mihrab and walls open to the sky.
Plan your visit
- Opening
- Open ground; daylight hours.
About
Most of Bagerhat's mosques have been put back together. This one has not, and that is its interest: a short walk north-west of Khan Jahan's tomb, past the Zinda Pir enclosure, you come to a brick shell standing in the open, roof long gone, walls broken off at shoulder height in places, the plan still perfectly readable. It was an oblong hall roofed by six domes in two rows of three, with octagonal towers at the corners rather than the usual round ones, and a large central mihrab in the west wall whose shape echoes the mausoleum nearby. Locals know it as the Chhoy Gombuj, the six-dome mosque.
It belongs to the fifteenth century, to the city's first generation, and the Department of Archaeology keeps it as a stabilised ruin. There is nobody at the gate and nothing to pay; come in the slanting light of late afternoon, when the broken arches throw long shadows across the grass.
Getting there: North-west of the tomb of Khan Jahan Ali, just beyond the Zinda Pir enclosure, five minutes on foot.
Things to do
- Trace the plan on the ground: six domes, two rows, and the big mihrab.
- See the Zinda Pir Mosque next door, which shows what this one looked like whole.
Good to know
- Watch your footing on the broken brick, and keep off the walls.
