At the foot of the Qutab Minar stands the first mosque to be built in India. An inscription over the east gate states that it was built with materials obtained from demolishing ‘27 idolatrous temples’. As well as intricate carvings that show a clear fusion of Islamic and pre-Islamic styles, the walls of the mosque are studded with sun disks, shikharas (rising towers) and other recognisable pieces of Hindu and Jain masonry. This was Delhi's main mosque until 1360.
Altamish, Qutb-ud-din’s son-in-law, expanded the original mosque with a cloistered court between 1210 and 1220, and Ala-ud-Din Khilji added the exquisite marble and sandstone Alai Darwaza gatehouse in 1310.
Nearby is the dainty tomb of the Turkic saint Imam Zamin, erected in the Lodi era.
