Kariz Underground City

The qanat (kariz) of Kish is one of the island’s historical and tourist areas and is more than 2,500 years old. This qanat is located 16 meters underground and its ceiling is covered with shells and corals which, according to information provided by local guides, have an age of 270 to 570 million years, but considering that the limestone-coral bed hosting them is the result of the activity of contemporary corals, their age cannot be more than a few thousand years. The area of this qanat is 10,000 square meters.
Engineer Mansour Haji Hosseini, an Iranian resident of Germany, invested in 1999 to build the Kish Underground City (Kariz) cultural and tourist complex.
The traditional Kariz market of Kish, in two branches with a total length of 15 kilometres, was established in 1994. The purpose of creating this market is to offer handicrafts and traditional products from various regions of Iran.
This is the only structure in the world whose ceiling is full of natural shells and corals. The mosque or prayer hall of the Kish Underground City is the only coral mosque in the world whose ceiling is full of marine fossils.
The newest phase of this attractive complex is a museum of fossils obtained from its coral ceiling that were examined at the University of Munich (Germany), have documentation, and date from 53 to 57 million years ago. Handicraft shops, a traditional photography studio, and a traditional teahouse are among the sections of this cultural and tourist complex.