مسجد الظاهر برقوق

This guide to the mosque, madrasa and mausoleum complex of Sultan Barquq on Cairo's medieval palace street follows the life of a man who began as a captured Christian boy from Circassia, sold in a Crimean bathhouse, and rose through the Mamluk ranks to seize the throne in 1382. It traces why he ordered this complex built two years later, complete with a domed chamber meant for his own burial, and the exile and comeback that interrupted his reign before his death in 1399. The carved octagonal minaret above marks a plan that took an unexpected turn. Look closely at the stonework bands unlike anything built before it.