Cemeteries and memorials to visit Samarkand

The necropolis of the 'Living King', Shah-i-Zinda, is an alleyway that climbs up the hill of Afrosyab and once led to the ancient city gates. An unusual street on the edge of which was built, in the 11th century, the mausoleum of Qassim-ibn Abbas, a Muslim missionary and cousin of the Prophet Mohammed who arrived in Sogdiana in 676 with the first wave of Arab conquerors. Qassim-ibn Abbas was beheaded by the infidels while he was praying, and legend has it that he then seized his head and descended into a well leading to paradise where he presided over a "court of souls" surrounded by two assessors. The legend takes up the Zoroastrian myth of the judges of the Underworld: Solar Mithra, Srôsh and Rashn, or that of the "Living King" dating from before the Islamic conquest, and which tells how, after his death, the Afrosyab king continued to reign in the kingdom of the dead. The Arab conquerors and the missionaries of Islam thus appropriated many Zoroastrian, Manichean or Nestorian beliefs for the benefit of the heroes of the new religion. In the 11th and 12th centuries, many tombs and mausoleums were built near the saint's mausoleum and the great mosque next to it. When the Mongols took and destroyed the ancient city of Samarkand, only the tomb of Qassim-ibn Abbas (also called Kussam or Kutham) was spared. In the Timurid period, in the 14th and 15th centuries, noble families and family members of Tamerlan were built mausoleums near the tomb of Qassim-ibn Abbas, the Islamic belief that the proximity of a saint's tomb provides protection in the afterlife. These new constructions gave the street its current configuration.

The entrance portal, or pishtak, is flanked by the first chortak, a small passage surmounted by a dome supported by four arches (literally: 'chortak'), where the following inscription can be read: 'This majestic ensemble was built by Abd-al-Aziz khan, son of Ulugh Begh, son of Shakhrukh, son of Amir Timur in the year 838 AH. "» (1434-1435). In fact, it was Uulough Begh who was the real builder on behalf of his still young son.

At the foot of the forty steps of the "Stairway to Paradise" or "Fishermen's Stairway", there is a mosque with iwan and finely carved colonnades where believers come to listen to the prayers of the imam. This is where Qassim-ibn Abbas would have been beheaded.

The staircase leads to the mausoleum of Kazy Zadeh Roumi, on the left, built between 1420 and 1435 for the tutor of Ulugh Begh. Considered the Plato of his time, Kazy Zade Rumi would not actually be buried here: the skeleton discovered in the mausoleum was that of a woman, perhaps Tamerlan's nurse. It is the largest building in the complex. The prayer room and the mausoleum are surmounted by two very high domes. The staircase was built in the 18th century on the site of the ancient walls surrounding Samarkand in the pre-Mongolian period. It goes up to the second chortak, dating from the 19th century and erected on the site of the ancient wall of Afrosyab.

The first mausoleum to the right of the second chortak is that of Emir Hussein, also known as Tuglu Tekin, son of a Turkish man named Kara Kutkul and a famous Turkish commander whom Tamerlan took as his model while claiming to be of his descent. Tamerlan had the mausoleum built in 1376, when Tuglu Tekin had died a martyr's death in the 8th century.

Facing him, the mausoleum of Emir Zade (son of the Emir) dates from 1386 and is said to contain the remains of an unknown son of Tamerlan. Just above, on the same side, the mausoleum of Shadi Mulk Aka (1372) was built on the order of Tourkan Ata, Tamerlan's sister, to bury her daughter. The emperor, for whom his niece meant a great deal, had the following inscription engraved: "This is a tomb where a precious pearl was lost. "It is the oldest mausoleum in the complex, and also the oldest building in Timurid Samarkand.

Opposite, in the mausoleum of Chirin Bika Aka (1385), lies Tamerlan's second sister, under a dome with a 16-sided base. The facade is decorated with dark blue openwork mosaics. The interior decoration was made by an artist from Azerbaijan. Surprisingly, on the façade on either side of the portal, the inscriptions in Arabic are not suras from the Koran, but words of the Greek philosopher Socrates. It reads: "Socrates said: people are sad in all circumstances. »

On the same side, the octahedral mausoleum remains a mystery. Dating from the 15th century, it is considered a mausoleum, but no human debris has been found there. According to another hypothesis, it could be a minaret, but there is no evidence of this in its vast rotunda architecture. Little is also known about the next three mausoleums on the left side of the driveway. The third chortak opens on the northern and last part of the necropolis. On the left is the Tuman Aka Mosque, built in 1405, and the adjoining mausoleum, built in 1404, for Tuman Aka, Tamerlan's youngest wife. On a square base, the turquoise blue dome rests on a high cylindrical drum. If the mosaics of the portal may recall the mausoleum of Chirin Bika Aka, the originality of the decoration lies in the use of the colour purple, extremely rare at the time. The interior has been deliberately left white, which is also unusual, and the decorations are limited to a few landscape frescoes under the dome. Above the finely carved wooden door it reads: "The tomb is a door that everyone goes through. "In front of the Tuman Aka Mosque, the finely worked elm wood door, once enhanced with gold, silver and ivory, is the work of the Shiraz master Yusuf. Nicknamed the "Gateway to Paradise", it has been opening for more than 600 years to the kingdom of Qassim-ibn Abbas. Excavations have unearthed, on the right wall of the corridor, remains of the wall of the former 11th century mosque, whose minaret can be seen above and to the right. It also dates from the 11th century, which makes it the oldest monument of the complex, and the only one from that period in the Shah-i-Zinda. Passing the "Gate of Paradise", the corridor leads to the Qassim-ibn Abbas Mosque. The mihrab is decorated in mosaic, a technique that was used in Samarkand from the end of the 14th century and of which Central Asian craftsmen became virtuoso. The glazed earthenware mosaic pieces depict leaves, flower petals, thin branches or inscriptions, and are assembled without gaps. The next room is the ziaratkhana, or prayer room. Behind a wooden fence in the gurkhana is the tomb of Qassim-ibn Abbas, dating from the 11th century and entirely decorated with majolica. It says: "He who has died following Allah, is not dead: he is indeed alive. "Archaeologists have also researched this area and discovered a shaft 18 metres deep. The decorations in the room may appear to be original as they have been erased. In fact, they were fully restored in 1995, but the humidity level was such that all the work was spoiled in the following months. An air conditioner was installed to try to remedy the problem, but one only has to look at the corners of the walls and floor to realize the vanity of the attempt. To save what remains, it is strongly advised against leaning against the walls or even putting your fingers on them.

Coming out of the saint's tomb, immediately to the right and opposite the Tuman Aka Mausoleum is the Kutlug Aka Mausoleum, from 1360, which houses another of Tamerlan's women. Its portal is decorated with chiselled and glazed terracotta.

Closing the northern end of the necropolis, the Khodja Akhmad Mausoleum dates from 1350 and is the oldest mausoleum of Shah-i-Zinda after that of Qassim-ibn Abbas. Its portal was decorated with blue and white majolica by the Samarkand craftsman, Fakhr Ali.

Like another great conqueror, Genghis Khan, Tamerlan wanted to be buried soberly: "Just one stone and my name on it," he said, and his tomb had been prepared in a crypt in Shahrisabz, his hometown. But history decided otherwise. In 1401, Muhamad Sultan, Tamerlan's favourite grandson and his appointed successor, built a four-minaret architectural complex consisting of an inner courtyard bordered by four iwans and overlooked by a madrasah to the east and a khanaka to the west. The madrasa was dedicated to the education of the sons of noble families destined to work in the administration. In the khanaka, residence of the dervishes, there was also a domed mosque. Today, only the traces of the foundations bear witness to these constructions, but one can admire the still richly decorated portal on which is inscribed in Persian: "Built by the weak slave Mohamed, son of Mahmud, of Espahan". When, in 1403, Muhamad Sultan, still young, perished during a campaign in Persia, Tamerlan had this mausoleum built, the most beautiful there is, for the one in whom he had seen his successor. When the first dome was completed, Tamerlan decided it was too small, had it destroyed and ordered a new, larger dome to be built, which was completed in less than two weeks. Ruy Gonzales de Clavijo recounts how the workers worked there day and night, and describes Tamerlan, sick and bedridden, coming twice in person to supervise the work. In February 1405, Tamerlan in turn died and his body, embalmed with musk and camphor, was temporarily and secretly buried in the khanaka next to his grandson. It was not until four years later, when the battles of succession were settled, that the royal remains returned to their present residence in the crypt of the mausoleum. On this occasion, Tamerlan's spiritual master, Sheikh Mir-Said-Bereke, was also buried. He was later joined by other Timurids, including two of Tamerlan's sons, Shakhrukh and Miranshakh, and his grandson Ulugh Begh. The latter added a gallery through which the mausoleum is now accessed and began the construction of another mausoleum, of which only ruins remain, and a crypt that can be seen behind the Gur Emir. It was also Ulugh Begh who brought back from Mongolia the block of nephrite that covers Tamerlan's tomb, and who had the mortuary slabs surrounded by an openwork marble barrier. The real tombs lie in the crypt. Like all the constructions of Tamerlan, the Gur Emir is grandiose. The volumes, simple, are of imposing size. The outer dome is 32 m high and a 3 m high Sufi inscription surrounds its base: it reads: "Allah is the only God and Muhammad is his prophet. "On this drum rests a stretched dome, 12.50 m high and 15 m in diameter, entirely covered with blue glazed bricks that sixty-four ribs dotted with yellow and midnight-blue rhombuses seem to stretch towards the sky. The interior of the mausoleum is even more sumptuous: firstly, the translucent green of the onyx walls, once decorated with gold and lazurite, then the blue and gold Qur'anic inscriptions that surround the room, and finally the dome, which the geometric gold decorations on a soft blue background make "like the firmament", in the words of the historian Cheref-ad-Din.