The Síyáh-Chál – the Black Pit

Entrance to the Síyáh-Chál

The Síyáh-Chál, into which Bahá’u’lláh was thrown, originally a reservoir of water for one of the public baths of Tihrán, was a subterranean dungeon in which criminals of the worst type were wont to be confined. The darkness, the filth, and the character of the prisoners, combined to make of that pestilential dungeon the most abominable place to which human beings could be condemned. 

- Nabil  (‘The Dawn-Breakers; translated and edited by Shoghi Effendi)

Síyáh-Chál - the Black Pit - was a subterranean dungeon in the capital of Iran, dim, damp and dismal, never knowing the rays of the sun. At one time it had been the water reservoir of a public bath. Few people survived who were kept there for long. Now, in the summer of 1852, they herded together all the Bábís on whom they could lay their hands in Tihran, cast them into this dungeon and chained and fettered them. Amongst them were men from all walks of life: from distinguished courtiers to humble artisans, from well-to-do merchants to learned students of theology. Baha'u'llah, Himself, was one of their number. 

- Balyuzi  (‘Baha’u’llah, the King of Glory)

We were consigned for four months to a place foul beyond comparison. As to the dungeon in which this Wronged One and others similarly wronged were confined, a dark and narrow pit were preferable. Upon Our arrival We were first conducted along a pitch-black corridor, from whence We descended three steep flights of stairs to the place of confinement assigned to Us. The dungeon was wrapped in thick darkness, and Our fellow-prisoners numbered nearly a hundred and fifty souls: thieves, assassins and highwaymen. Though crowded, it had no other outlet than the passage by which We entered. No pen can depict that place, nor any tongue describe its loathsome smell. Most of these men had neither clothes nor bedding to lie on. God alone knoweth what befell Us in that most foul-smelling and gloomy place!

- Baha’u’llah  (‘Epistle to the Son of the Wolf’)