Glazed tilework is one of the glories of Afghanistan’s Islamic architecture. An early landmark is the 12th-century Minaret of Jam, where the letters of the central inscription are picked out in turquoise glaze, the earliest recorded use of this feature in Ghurid building. Herat’s Friday Mosque also preserves a Ghurid portal with tiled calligraphic and geometric ornament.
The art reached its height under the Timurids in the 15th century, when coloured tiles covered façades and the inside and outside of domes with floral, geometric and calligraphic designs. Some of the finest work was made in Herat in the mo‘arraq, or mosaic, technique: tiles of a single colour were cut into small shapes, fitted together and bonded with plaster into panels that could be fixed to walls, squinches and domes.
The ribbed dome of Queen Gawharshad’s mausoleum and a tower of Herat’s citadel still carry Timurid tilework. Great monuments such as Herat’s Friday Mosque and the Blue Mosque in Mazar-e Sharif kept their own workshops to make and repair their tiles.