Samarra Abbasid's Capital 836 AD to 892 AD

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In 836 the Abbasid caliphate's Turkic and Armenian slave soldiers -known as Mamluk- agitated the citizens of Baghdad, provoking riots. 

The capital of the Caliphate was moved from Baghdad to the new city of Samarra later that year by Caliph Al-Mu'tasim.
During this time the original pre-Islamic settlement was replaced with a new city established in 833. Samara would remain the capital of the Muslim world until 892 when it was returned to Baghdad by al-Mu'tamid. Al-Mu'tasim's successor, al-Wathiq, developed Samara into a commercial city, and it was further developed under Caliph Al-Mutawakkil.
The latter sponsored the construction of the Great Mosque of Samarra with its spiral minaret or malwiyah, built in 847. He also laid out parks and a palace for his son Al-Mu'tazz. Under the rule of Al-Mu'tadid, the Abbassid capital was shifted back to Baghdad and Samarra entered a prolonged decline, which accelerated after the 13th century when the course of the Tigris shifted

The Great Mosque of Samara

The Mosque of al-Mutawakkil
 The first mosque, built in 836, has now disappeared; it was replaced in 849-852 by a new mosque built on a grand scale, which for a long time was the largest mosque of the Islamic world. It continued to be used until the end of the 11th century.

The mosque itself measures 239 x 156m, with 17 aisles in the prayer hall and a triple portico around the courtyard. The piers were reconstructed as octagonal with marble columns on the corners; however, only one pier base exists today. The mihrab was decorated with glass mosaic, of which only small fragments survived. The excavations of the Iraq Directorate of Antiquities in the 1960s discovered in situ fragments of panels of dark blue glass, which lined the walls.
The mosque is set in an outer enclosure measuring 374 x 443m. In this enclosure there are covered porticoes to accommodate additional faithful at the Friday prayer (ziyada), and a building behind the mihrab which seems to have been intended to receive the Caliph, and perhaps accommodate the imam of the mosque.

The famous minaret is 52 m high, with a square base, and a spiral exterior staircase, up which the caliph al-Mutawakkil is said to have ridden on a white Egyptian donkey. At the top there are traces of a wooden pavilion to protect the muezzin.
Three avenues, 52 m wide, were cut through the houses to permit easy access to the mosque.

Note that the minaret were used for Astronomical observations.

when the Abbasides moved their Capital Back to Baghdad, the importance of Samarra declined and the Great mosque was left to time which caused the collapse of its roof and some parts of its structure.

this is a picture of the Mosque from google earth.

and this is the layout

The Minaret

The Great Mosque - exterior of Qibla (south) wall

The Great Mosque - mihrab (interior of south wall)

The Great Mosque - from the minaret

sources

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Mosque_of_Samarra

The Great Mosque, Samarra, Iraq 
Photo of The Great Mosque 
http://www.dur.ac.uk/derek.kennet/mosque.htm