The Kalyan minaret is a minaret

Minaret

A minaret مناره , sometimes مئذنه) is a distinctive architectural feature of Islamic mosques, generally a tall spire with an onion-shaped or conical crown, usually either free standing or taller than any associated support structure. The basic form of a minaret includes a base, shaft, and gallery....

 of the Po-i-Kalyan

Po-i-Kalyan

The title Po-i-Kalyan , which means "The foot of the Great", belongs to the architectural complex located at the foot of the great Kalyan minaret in Bukhara, Uzbekistan.-History:...

 mosque

Mosque

A mosque is a place of worship for followers of Islam. The word is likely to have entered the English language through French , from Portuguese , from Spanish , and from Berber , ultimately originating in — . The Arabic word masjid literally means a place of prostration...

 complex in Bukhara

Bukhara

Bukhara , from the Soghdian βuxārak , is the capital of the Bukhara Province of Uzbekistan. The nation's fifth-largest city, it has a population of 263,400 . The region around Bukhara has been inhabited for at least five millennia, and the city has existed for half that time...

, Uzbekistan

Uzbekistan

Uzbekistan , officially the Republic of Uzbekistan is a doubly landlocked country in Central Asia and one of the six independent Turkic states. It shares borders with Kazakhstan to the west and to the north, Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan to the east, and Afghanistan and Turkmenistan to the south....

 and one of the most prominent landmarks in the city.

The minaret, designed by Bako, was built by the Qarakhanid ruler Arslan Khan in 1127 to summon Muslims to prayer five times a day. An earlier tower collapsed before completion.
It is made in the form of a circular-pillar baked brick

Brick

A brick is a block of ceramic material used in masonry construction, usually laid using various kinds of mortar. It has been regarded as one of the longest lasting and strongest building materials used throughout history.-History:...

 tower, narrowing upwards. It is 45.6 metres (149.61 ft) high (48 metres including the point), of 9 metres (29.53 ft) diameter at the bottom and 6 metres (19.69 ft) overhead.

The body of the minaret is topped by a rotunda

Rotunda (architecture)

A rotunda is any building with a circular ground plan, sometimes covered by a dome. It can also refer to a round room within a building . The Pantheon in Rome is a famous rotunda. A Band Rotunda is a circular bandstand, usually with a dome...

 with 16 arched fenestrations, from which the muedzins summoned the Muslims in the city to prayer. There is a brick spiral staircase that twists up inside around the pillar to the rotunda. Once the minaret was believed to have had another round section above the rotunda, but now only the cone-shaped top remains. The tower base has narrow ornamental strings belted across it made of bricks which are placed in both straight or diagonal fashion. The frieze is covered with a blue glaze with inscriptions.

In times of war, warriors used the minaret as a watchtower to lookout for enemies .

About a hundred years after its construction, the tower so impressed Genghis Khan

Genghis Khan

Genghis Khan , born Temujin and occasionally known by his temple name Taizu , was the founder and Great Khan of the Mongol Empire, which became the largest contiguous empire in history after his death....

 that he ordered it to be spared when all around was destroyed by his men. It is also known as the Tower of Death, because until as recently as the early twentieth century criminals were executed by being thrown from the top. Fitzroy Maclean

Fitzroy Maclean

Sir Fitzroy Hew Royle MacLean of Dunconnel, 1st Baronet KT CBE was a Scottish soldier, writer and politician. He was a Unionist MP from 1941 to 1974 and was one of few people who entered World War II as a private and left having risen to the rank of Brigadier.Maclean wrote several books, including...

, who made a surrepitious visit to the city in 1938, says in his memoir Eastern Approaches

Eastern Approaches

Eastern Approaches is an autobiographical account of the early career of Fitzroy Maclean. It is divided into three parts: his life as a junior diplomat in Moscow and his travels in the Soviet Union, especially the forbidden zones of Central Asia; his exploits in the British Army and SAS in the...

, "For centuries before 1870, and again in the troubled years between 1917 and 1920, men were cast down to their death from the delicately ornamented gallery which crowns it."