Ganjali Khan Complex, Kerman

The Ganjali Khan Complex is a Safavid civic centre in the old heart of Kerman, built in the years around 1600 by Ganj Ali Khan, governor of Kerman for Shah Abbas I from 1596 to 1621. Around a rectangular square it groups a bathhouse, a caravanserai, a mint, a mosque, a school, a water cistern and a bazaar, and its bathhouse, with painted ceilings and costumed figures, is one of the best museums of its kind in Iran.

A governor’s showpiece

Ganj Ali Khan was one of the Kurdish officers who rose with Shah Abbas I, and he governed Kerman, and later also Sistan and Kandahar, for a quarter of a century. Like the shah in Isfahan, he used a new square to give the city a new centre, with trade, worship, bathing and government around one open space. Inscriptions on the buildings date the work, and one of them, on the caravanserai portal, names the calligrapher Alireza Abbasi, who also designed inscriptions for the shah’s buildings in Isfahan. The square was planned along the main bazaar of the city, so the complex was a working part of Kerman’s economy rather than a palace set apart. The wider story of the city is on our page on Kerman.

The bathhouse

The Ganjali Khan bathhouse (حمام گنجعلی‌خان), entered from the bazaar on the south side of the square, is the highlight. Built in 1611, it served the city as a public bath for centuries and was turned into an anthropology museum in 1971.

You go down a passage into the sarbineh, the domed changing hall, where bathers undressed, rested and talked on raised platforms around a central pool. The vaults and walls are covered with painted plaster, tile and carved stone, with Safavid painted decoration around the entrance. Life-size figures, made at the Faculty of Fine Arts of Tehran University in 1973, show the bath in use: bath attendants, barbers and bathers at rest. The figures are a little theatrical, but they bring the rooms to life. Beyond is the hot room, the garmkhaneh, with its own pools and alcoves. Look up at the light openings in the domes, and down: the patterns of the stone floors were designed to echo the vaults above.

Around the square

The caravanserai

On the east side of the square is the caravanserai, with a tiled portal bearing the foundation inscription of 1598. Inside is a classic four-iwan courtyard with two storeys of rooms and an octagonal pool in the centre.

The mint and coin museum

The former mint (ضرابخانه), a domed building with a cupola that let in light and let out the heat of the furnaces, became a coin museum in 1970. It shows coins of many periods, from the Parthians and Sasanians to the Safavids and Afsharids.

The mosque, the cistern and the bazaar

Beside the caravanserai on the east side is a small mosque with fine tile and stone work, one of the most refined buildings of the complex. The water cistern (ab-anbar) stored drinking water for the quarter. Along the south side, the stretch of bazaar called the Ganjali Khan Bazaar runs for about 93 metres, with painted and plastered vaults and openings onto the square. It continues as part of Kerman’s long covered bazaar, which links the old city from end to end; walking it is the best way to reach the complex.

Practical notes

• The complex is in the old city centre, in the middle of the bazaar, and easy to combine with Kerman’s Jameh Mosque and the rest of the bazaar.
• Allow at least an hour for the bathhouse alone. Separate entrances and tickets may apply to the bathhouse and coin museum; check current opening hours locally.
• From Kerman, day trips run to Shazdeh Garden in Mahan, Rayen Castle and the Kaluts of Shahdad.