Al-Muhdhar Mosque

Tarim's great mosque, with a 50-metre mud-brick minaret reputedly the tallest in Yemen.

The Al-Muhdhar Mosque, named for the 14th-century Sufi scholar Umar al-Muhdhar, is the spiritual centre of Tarim. The square white-washed prayer hall is impressive in its own right, but it is the minaret that takes the breath away — a single soaring pillar of mud-brick rising over a town otherwise no more than two or three storeys high.

The minaret is best seen from a distance at sunset, when the low light catches the white plaster against the orange canyon walls behind. The mosque is in daily use; non-Muslim visitors should be respectful and avoid prayer times.

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A story
The minaret of Al-Muhdhar, built in 1914 by master mason Awad Salman and completed in 1915, is around 50 metres (165 feet) tall and made entirely of stamped earth and lime — no steel or concrete. It is the tallest mud-brick minaret in the world. The design was reportedly inspired by Cairo's Mamluk-era minarets but executed in the local Hadrami earthen tradition.