Monuments to visit Boukhara

Lost in the alleys east of Liab-i-Khaouz. Tchor Minor means "four minarets". In fact, they are four towers that marked the entrance to a madrasah, now disappeared, built in 1807 by a wealthy Turkmen merchant. Each turret symbolized a city: Termez, Denau, Kounia-Ourgentch and Mecca. Originally, the madrasa had 59 cells and was run by the Sufi Sheikh, Khali Niaz Kholi, one of the most respected and influential naqchbandi of the early 19th century. A staircase leads to a vaulted room and then to the roof.

This artificial hill of about twenty meters high was the residence of the Lords of Bukhara. Twenty metres high, many of which are due to the piling up of the ruins of palaces and citadels destroyed and rebuilt in the same place, as a result of the conquests and looting of the city. The oldest foundations found on the site date back more than 2,500 years, but the part visible today is from the 18th century. According to the legend reported by a 16th century Bukhara historian, the founder of Bukhara is Prince Siyavush-ibn Keivakus. The young prince, fleeing from his father, crossed the Jeihun (Amou Daria) and took refuge with Afrosyab, the legendary king, founder of Samarkand. He was welcomed with kindness and married Afrosyab's daughter. Siyavush built a citadel on his new land, but he came into conflict with his father-in-law, and his father-in-law had him murdered a few years later. His body was buried at the foot of his palace, near the east gate, and for a long time the inhabitants of Bukhara worshipped his grave. In the 8th century, the Zoroastrian city was invaded by the Arab conquerors, the citadel destroyed, and a mosque was erected there in 713, in place of the Temple of Fire. Rebuilt by the Samanids, then by the Karakhanids, it was each time destroyed successively by the Kara-Kitai and the Korezmshah and then, in the 13th century, by the Mongols, who, faithful to their reputation, left only ashes. In the 16th century, the Chaybanids undertook the construction of a citadel worthy of their ambitions by raising an artificial hill 800 m in diameter and 20 m high, but it did not withstand the attacks of Nadir Shah. The palace that can be visited today dates back to the Uzbek khanats of the 18th and early 20th centuries. At that time, the Ark was a city within the city inhabited by more than 3,000 people. The complex included gardens, administrative buildings, cowsheds, depots, the Treasury, the armoury, stables, prisons, a mosque, mausoleums, jewellers' shops and the residence of the emir, his wives, family members and slaves in their service. Unfortunately, only 20% of these constructions remain today. Indeed, in September 1920, the Bolshevik army, commanded by General Mikhail Frounze, fired a cannon on the citadel. A fire broke out as Emir Alim Khan fled. We're guessing he might have set it off himself before he fled. The tour begins with the west gate built in 1740 by Nadir Shah. The monumental gate is flanked by two turrets. When Armin Vambery stayed in Bukhara in 1863, he described the Ark as a "den of tyranny" and shuddered at the thought of the Westerners who were then confined there. The door was surrounded by fourteen ornate bronze cannons, a trophy of the Emir's victorious campaign against the Khanate of Kokand. It was also adorned with a clock - disappeared - with an unusual history. Giovanni Orlandi, the Italian watchmaker who made it, had been kidnapped by slave traders in Orenburg in the mid-19th century. The Italian saved his head by promising the Emir to build him a time measuring machine. The Emir was capricious and never tired of the wonders of European technology, but the watchmaker was a believer, stubborn, loved wine and refused to convert to Islam, which was fatal to him. He was the last European to have his head cut off. The covered terrace above the arch of the gate was intended for the Emir and the princely family, who had a front row seat to attend the celebrations and public executions that took place in Registan Square. Beneath the gate, the only remnant from the 19th century, a vaulted corridor is pierced by twelve dark niches, narrow, unsanitary prisons where the personal enemies of the Emir were locked up. One of the niches housed a lantern that burned permanently, to celebrate the memory of Siyavush. It is through this corridor that visitors enter the Ark where souvenir vendors have replaced the prisoners. Most of the buildings such as the apartments of the kushbegi or the kori khana have been transformed into museums: museums of History, Archaeology and Numismatics.

The korunishkhana or throne room. The vast courtyard surrounded by iwan dates from the 17th century. Almost entirely destroyed in the fire of 1920, it has been restored. In the iwan at the back of the court is the throne of the emir in engraved marble, made by craftsmen from Nourata in 1669. During the coronation and official events, the floor was covered with carpet. In the agorakhana, or musical pavilion, an orchestra punctuated the various events of the day, and traditional makom accompanied the Emir's outings and all the official events that took place in the main square. The western part of the fortress offers a splendid view of the monuments of Bukhara, especially Poy Kalon. You can also climb to the steel tower in front of the fortress on the other side of the boulevard (40,000 soums). There you will have a dominant view of the historical center of Bukhara. At sunset, low lights illuminate the fortress walls.

These massive constructions with unusual bulbs, dating from the 16th century, have a very functional architecture. Located at the crossroads of the streets, they have high ogival entrances that allowed traders and camels loaded with goods to move freely. The covered galleries in which the stalls are set up intersect in a central hall surmounted by a high dome. It is cooler here than outside, and the visitor, overwhelmed by the warmth, appreciates the qualities of a commercially oriented architecture when a shrewd merchant invites him to sit in the semi-darkness of his antique shop.

Today, only three of these merchant domes called tâk, which date back to the Chaybanid era, remain, along with the tim Abdullah Khan. In the past, the shopping streets leading to these domes were also lined with shops and protected from the sun by reed mats. Drowning in eternal dust, the traffic was exotic as far as possible, mixing quadrupeds of all sizes and bipeds from all walks of life. Armin Vambery, who in the 19th century was one of the few foreigners to be able to wander freely around the city, says that without having the brilliance and magnificence of the markets of Tehran or Esfahan, the markets of Bukhara were striking for the diversity of races and costumes that one met there.

Tak-i-sarrafan, the dome of the Money Changers. By following westward the canal that borders the southern flank of the Liab-i-Khaouz, one arrives at the Tak-i-Sarrafan dome, known as the "dome of the changers". It was built in 1538 and housed the Jewish money-changers, who were the only ones allowed to engage in this trade, the Uzbeks considering it to be bad luck. If mosques and madrasas are the heart of Bukhara, the merchant domes are its nervous system. It is, in fact, thanks to trade and the resulting taxes that the city was able to experience such a boom.

Tak-i-Telpak Furushan, the dome of the hatters. North of the Magok-i-Attari Mosque, Taq-i-Telpak Furushan, or Dome of the Hatters, was located in the raba, or outer city, just at the southern gate of Shahristan. They sold all kinds of hats, embroidered tioubetek or fur hats, but also books. The tomb of the holy man, Khodja Ahmed-i-Paran, is a reminder to the merchants that there is more than material wealth. Despite its name, the hatters' dome now houses carpet sellers.

The Tim Abdullah Khan. Going north up Hakikat Street, the Tim Abdullah Khan is on the right after the bazaar of hatters. This covered market dates from the end of the 16th century. Today you can find the most beautiful hand woven ikatee silks and a wide selection of carpets from all over the world. The looms are shown at the bottom of the timer.

Tak-i-Zargaran, the dome of the jewelers. Unlike the dome of the hatters, that of the jewellers was located in Shahristan, the inner city of the Middle Ages, between the Mir-i-Arab madrasa and the Ulugh Begh and Abdul Aziz Khan madrasas. Even today, the jewellery merchants are not far away. There is indeed a small gold market in Khodja Nurabad Street, next to the large carpet market. There is some jewelry in the dome of the jewelers, but of poor quality; most shops sell handcrafted souvenirs.

The house of the former President of the People's Republic of Turkestan dates from the end of the 19th century and was built by the father of Fayzulloh, a wealthy Bukharian merchant. An admirable job has been done to reproduce the interior of this house as it was until 1925, when it was transformed into a school by the Bolsheviks. Many murals and period furniture can be admired in the rooms surrounding the three inner courtyards of the house. The rooms of the ichkari, the part of the house reserved for the family, have beautiful period beams and walls with small niches in the style of the old houses of Bukhara. These niches, before finding a decorative vocation, were used as storage spaces and allowed to do without furniture. The iwan, extraordinarily decorated with warm colours and geometric patterns, is made of elm wood that had to be restored many years before it was completed. To get the full measure of this exceptional house, it is best to make an appointment and subscribe to a guided tour (usually in English). You certainly won't regret paying the extra charge for taking pictures either. In the courtyard, note the bust of Fayzulloh Khodjaev. It used to sit in the southwest corner of Liab-i-Khaouz and was cut in three so that it could be reintegrated into the house of its model.

The summer residence of the khans of Bukhara is located in a huge park of more than 6 ha, 5 km from the city. It is a privileged place for walking because of its coolness, especially during the hot summer hours. A first palace surrounded by gardens was built by Amir Akhad Khan at the end of the 19th century. Alim Khan, his son, added a new building in 1914. Bukhara's last khan had studied in St. Petersburg, and his way of life was affected. He commissioned a palace that was undoubtedly intended to be at the cutting edge of modernity, blending Russian architecture with the decorative style of Central Asia. The result is surprising. The tour includes three different bodies of buildings, which have been transformed into museums: the apartments and reception rooms of Alim khan, the octagonal palace and the harem. The reception rooms of Emir Alim Khan, built in a row, in the western style, are a contribution of the Russian architects working at the court of the Emir. The white room is a unique work of art, its walls are entirely covered with finely chiselled white gantch on a background of mirrors. The construction of this Bukhar version of the Ice Palace took three years, during which the architect refused the khan entry to the construction site. When Alim Khan was finally able to admire the result, he was overwhelmed and, resuming the good old ancestral habits, decided to have the architect killed so that he could not share his art with others. Fortunately, Chirin Muradov, the architect of the clean room, was warned in time and managed to escape. At the entrance, a high boudoir is decorated with stalactite niches in which are painted unusual and beautiful bouquets of multicoloured flowers. The walls and ceiling of the games room and waiting room are entirely decorated with gold panels, covered with an extraordinary and somewhat oppressive mosaic of mirrors. The banquet hall is the most original and sumptuous, it had four decorative walls, one for each season, which were changed thanks to a mechanism that no one remembers, but, in any case, the other three decorations disappeared after the revolution. In these rooms are displayed various gifts offered to the Emir, including an original all-glass refrigerator. The mirzo-khona, or secretary's room, is the most sober of the rooms, its three-wing mirror is, it seems, magical. Looking at it, you have to make a wish, which comes true within 40 days... At the end of the building, the veranda exposes a beautiful collection of antique vases from all over the world. The octagonal palace is a museum devoted to national costume, where ceremonial clothes, multicoloured khalat or dark paranjas are displayed amidst pictures of the princely family. Clothes were usually made by women, but gold thread designs were embroidered only by men. The octahedral hall for guests was originally decorated with gold leaf; after the revolution, gold would have been replaced by bronze and taken to Russia. The harem houses the Embroidery Museum. The different decorative techniques are illustrated by one of the most beautiful collections of suzani from Uzbekistan. In front of the harem is a large body of water. It is said that the Emir used to sit in the domed platform that borders this pool to watch his wives bathe, and would choose the chosen one from his heart by throwing an apple at her.

The city was fortified from the very beginning. The Ark was a citadel surrounded by high walls, and Shakhrestan, the Inner City, also had its walls. And to protect itself from nomadic attacks, the oasis of Bukhara was surrounded by a wide enclosure of several tens of kilometres. It was consolidated in the 8th century, after the Arab conquest. Like the city, these fortifications were frequently destroyed and rebuilt. At the end of the ninth century, Ismail Samani had the wall surrounding the oasis of Bukhara rebuilt again: "As long as I am alive," he said, "I will be the wall of Bukhara. "During the reign of Abdul Aziz Khan in 1540, the imposing walls that protected the city from the outside world were 12 km long and 11 m high. They had 11 sturdy double doors flanked by turrets that remained closed at night. The walls suffered some clashes during the feudal wars, but protected the city until the Russian conquest. In 1920, the Bolshevik army left only a few kilometres of it, large parts of which can still be seen today in the bazaar district and in the south-west of the city. The best-preserved parts are just north of the Ismail Samani Mausoleum, around the Talipoch Gate, once decorated with gold nails, and one of only two that have survived to the present day. It was here, until the Russians arrived, that the slave market was held, which has since been replaced by the great bazaar Kolkhoznaya.

Sadly famous, these prisons built in the 18th century tried to rival hell. On Fridays, some prisoners were freed from the chains around their necks, and compassionate relatives or passers-by could bring them food for the week. Perhaps the supreme punishment was not death, but a 6-metre deep well, the "black well", where the condemned were forgotten among the rats and all the most voracious insects of creation. Some captives managed to survive for several months. In 1839, an Englishman, Lieutenant Charles Stoddart, charged with making an alliance with Emir Nasrullah, tasted the distress of the Black Well for disrespecting the Emir by riding when he should have been walking, and walking when he should have been crawling. Furthermore, his mission statement was not from Queen Victoria. He spent six months at the bottom of the hole before earning his grace by converting to Islam. He remained a prisoner but was free to move around the city and stay in his own apartments. In September 1840, a captain of the Bengal Light Infantry, Arthur Conolly, came to inquire about the fate of his compatriot and to try to free him. Shortly after his arrival, the British army was defeated in Afghanistan at the Battle of Khyber Pass. The Emir, in a position of strength, convinced by his advisers that Conolly was a spy, had the two men thrown into the black well. In June 1842, when Conolly refused to convert to Islam, the two English officers were executed in Registan Square, where their bodies probably still lie. Nothing is known of their deaths, however, it is said that Stoddart, a convert to Islam, died beheaded or with his throat cut, but without suffering. Conolly, who refused conversion, probably wasn't so lucky. The story is known thanks to the notebook that Conolly held to the bottom of his well, which was found by the Reverend Joseph Wolff in 1845. Hopkirk's book, The Great Game, also tells the story of these two heroic victims of the "great game" in detail. Mannequins now replace the most famous prisoners of the Black Pit, but the two English officers are not represented. Outside the prisons is the tomb of Saint Kuchar Ata, overlooked by the traditional perch, where prisoners were allowed to practice religious rites.