Mihrab is semicircular niche in the wall of a mosque that indicates the qibla, the direction of the Kaaba. Historians narrate an wonderful story about the mihrab of Makkah Masjid. Muhammad Quli Qutub Shah, the fifth ruler of the Qutub Shahi dynasty, was said to have commissioned bricks to be made from the soil brought from Makkah, the holiest site of Islam, and used them in the construction of the central arch of the mosque, thus giving the mosque its name. The niche, which is its place for prayer, was made with an entire rock of such enormous size that, 600 labours besides stonecutters spent five years in quarrying it from the Gagan Pahad, near Shamsabad. It required still more time to roll it up on to conveyance and it took 1400 oxen to draw it.
More than 8,000 workers were employed to build the mosque. Muhammad Quli Qutub Shah personally laid the foundation stone.
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