Qala Ikhtyaruddin is central to the turbulent history of the city and is an impressive example of surviving citadels (hisar) in the region. Alexander the Great besieged Herat in 330 BC during his campaign against the Achaemenid Persian Empire. Known at the time as Artacoana, Herat was rebuilt and called Alexandria of Aria, and it is believed that a citadel was first established on its current site during this period. Incorporated into the northern perimeter of a square walled city by the Ghaznavids, the Qala stood witness to the changing fortunes of successive empires before being laid waste by Genghis Khan in 1222. Rebuilt by the Kart dynasty in 1245, Herat was again destroyed by Timurlan in 1381. His son Shah Rukh transformed the Ikhtyaruddin Citadel sometime after 1415, when the fortifications were entirely re-built and new buildings were erected inside its walls. After falling into decline under the Mughals, Herat was the centre of a struggle for territorial control between the Persians, Uzbeks and Afghans. Critical to British strategy during the “Great Game,” its forces assisted Afghans in defending Herat against a joint Russian-Persian assault in 1837. Their fortified positions were located within the citadel, before the city was formally designated as part of the emerging Afghan state in 1857. While Qala Ikhtyaruddin continued at times to play an important defensive role, its earth and fired brick structure fell into disrepair. This prompted the central government to initiate a joint programme of consolidation and preservation with UNESCO in 1976. 

The citadel complex extends over 250 metres in length and is 70 metres wide in places. It is divided into two main walled enclosures. The uppermost is roughly rectilinear in plan and is built on a  manmade mound, on which ruins of officers’ quarters and the treasury survive. The lower enclosure is divided from the older, higher section by a narrow street with a fortified entrance to the south, and has a series of stable buildings dating from the 19th century grouped around an extensive courtyard space, all enclosed by lower walls to the south. There are 18 brick towers set within the defensive perimeter walls that are in places two meters thick and rise to an average height of 16 metres over stone foundations. The bodies of most walls are filled with a conglomerate of broken fired bricks in mud mortar, with timber ties used in many places to strengthen the structure.