A golden dome and a minaret toward the sky is the most familiar picture that many people have in mind from the paradise of Mashhad.

All people who travel to Khurasan with the hope of pilgrimage and take their steps toward Mashhad al-Reza (A.S.) have recorded this image in their minds on the eve of drinking the sweet nectar of being present in the heavenly shrine of Imam, and exactly when the brightness of the dome sparks in their eyes and springs of their eyes run and their lips moved by a “Peace O Ali Ibn Musa al-Reza (A.S.)”.

An image which, in any framework, evokes your pilgrimage nostalgic senses and accompanies the bird of your heart in a love flying with the pigeons of the Holy Shrine.

The golden dome of Imam Reza's (A.S.) shrine is one of the most beautiful religious perspectives which has, by brightness of its golden bricks, always earned the respect of all pilgrims. A lovesick pilgrim who, with the intention of pilgrimage, has traveled long distances and has entered into the holy city of Mashhad becomes, by seeing the golden dome, full of passion and eagerness to go on the pilgrimage to Imam Reza’s (A.S.) illuminated shrine.

This piece of poem may be a good description of these moments:

As soon as I saw your dome from a long distance

Suddenly, my infected heart became full of sensation

During the glorious history of this dome, however, there are some days reviewing of which is hard for the devotees of this holy place. On these days some people made an unforgivable temerity and bombarded this illuminated dome.

This photo is the only document left from this bitter incident. An incident which is narrated by the history in this way: After the “Muhammad Ali Shah’s” escape in 1912 and on the last days of minor dictatorship Mashhad was involved in turmoil.   The cavalries and infantries of Russia entered Mashhad in order to protect and save their interests and according to the order received from the capital, “Ali Naqi Mirza Rokn al-Duleh” who was the governor of Khurasan placed them in the government palace.

The rebels who stimulated people against Constitution and also for supporting Muhammad Ali Shah and those who created unrest in the city were, in fact, organized to provide a pretext for the presence of the Russians.        

According to the order issued by the commander General “Roko”, Russians put their guns on the roofs of the surrounding homes and the stores near the Holy Shrine. The locations of guns were the Grand Bazaar, Saraye Bank, Bala Khiyaban, Bagh Khuni, and several other places.

Russian Cossacks and officers scattered in the streets of the city riding and on foot. Under the pretext of cracking the rebels down, on the 10th of Rabi al-Sani in 1330 the Cossacks bombarded the blessed dome of the Holy Shrine from several parts of the city.

18 parts of the golden dome were destroyed by that attack. After that incident, to complain about the temerity of Russians, the people went to the Britain consulate. After that complain, “Sir Percy Sykes”, the console general and some other people from the consulate who were accompanied by the photographer of the consulate went to the Atiq courtyard to see the destructions on the dome. The photographer was ordered to take some photos from the southern angles, the places to which cannonball were shot.

The British photographer took more than one picture from these destructions but only one picture has been left and that picture has been printed many times in the press.

In his book, Sykes writes “the Russian console had denied bombardment of the dome and the destruction of the tomb in his report but I repudiated this claim by sending some pictures to the British consulate in Tehran and San Petersburg.

This photo which depicts the shootings of Russian cannonballs to the golden dome is considered as an important and worth thinking pictorial document of historical, political, and religious incidents of a city and a country. This image deeply depicts the attack laceration and also the spiritual and mundane plunder of a country by aliens. In this incident, the cannonballs split some points of the dome which were as big as sugarloaf. The places of these shootings are still   observable from the inner part of the dome.

After covering the dome with gold, several incidents including Uzbeks’ sedition in 997 A.D. destroyed the gold of the dome. At this time, Abd al-Mu'men Khan Uzbek looted the valuable objects of Astan Quds Razavi and also the gold of the dome and the minaret. After this incident, in 1010 A.D. when Shah Abbas Safavid walked from Isfahan to Mashhad, he ordered for re-gilding the dome. This work was finished in 1016 A.D. and Ali Reza Abbasi, the famous calligrapher of the Safavid period, was appointed as the person in charge of writing the inscription around the dome with outstanding Thulth style.

Another incident also destroyed the dome and that was a heavy earthquake which took place in 1048 A.D. In this earthquake, a crack was created on the outer surface of the dome and a few of its glided bricks fell down. Shah Esmaeil Safavid is the person that reconstructing and re-gilding of the dome has been recorded by his name in the history. Another shameful incident in the history of Mashhad, which were fully explained above was bombardment of the dome by pro Tsar Russians.

All these incidents and also the abrasion of the golden coverage of the dome over time caused responsible persons to think fundamentally about the reconstruction and redecoration of the dome after the victory of the Islamic revolution.

This picture shows a view of the dome in 1354 which was taken by Ali Asghar Naseri. In this view, in addition to the dome, the dome and minaret of Du-Darb (two doors) School is also observed.

In order to reconstruct the dome of the Razavi illuminated shrine, the old bricks were removed from the dome surface and it was covered by a layer of concrete. After doing so, the dome was decorated by cupric bricks covered by gold. These golden bricks have covered around 700 square meters of the dome.

In terms of the structure of building and also the height, Imam Reza’s (A.S.) illuminated dome has been built with the highest possible level of art and beauty. This dome has got two layers. The first layer is the Holy Shrine’s roof which is concave and archedand it is called cupola. The second layer is located on it and that is the golden dome. There is a space of 13 meters between the two domes. The weight of the dome is on the walls of the hall (Holy Shrine) the thickness of which reaches to 90.2 meters.

The height of the cupola from the Holy Shrine’s floor is 80.18 and it is 20.31 to the dome or the highest convex point. The dome’s perimeter from outside is 10.42 meters and its height from the beginning of golden coverage up to the sharping point 40.16 and the height of the collar of the dome is 3.50 meters. From the beginning of the golden coverage up to the dome’s arm banding point or the height of the stem up to the beginning of the gilded bricks is 79.4 meters.

/149