Bibi-Khanym Mosque

In 1399, back from his sack of Delhi, Timur ordered a Friday mosque for Samarkand that would outdo anything in the Islamic world. Builders, stone-carvers and craftsmen from across his conquests worked on it, and elephants from India are said to have hauled the stone. The Castilian ambassador Ruy González de Clavijo saw it under construction in 1404. Timur, dissatisfied with the height of the entrance, had the portal rebuilt, and he pushed the work so fast that the mosque was complete within about five years.

Ambition and collapse

The ambition outran the engineering. The vast domes were heavy for their walls, and bricks reportedly began to fall soon after completion. Over the following centuries the mosque was abandoned, plundered for building material and shaken by earthquakes; the great quake of 1897 brought down much of the main sanctuary. Restoration began in the 1970s and continued after independence, rebuilding the main dome and much of the portal, while leaving parts of the complex as ruins.

What you see today

• The entrance portal, flanked by massive round towers, still among the tallest in Central Asia.
• The courtyard, once enclosed by a gallery of several hundred marble columns, with three domed sanctuaries facing it.
• The main sanctuary opposite the entrance, crowned by a turquoise dome about 40 metres high, its interior largely bare after the collapses.
• The great stone Quran stand in the centre of the courtyard, made of marble under Ulugbek to hold an enormous Quran. Tradition says that a woman who crawls beneath it will be blessed with children.

The legend of the kiss

The mosque is named after Timur’s senior wife, Saray Mulk Khanum, called Bibi-Khanym. In the best-known legend she built it as a surprise for Timur’s return, and the architect, smitten, demanded a kiss in exchange for finishing in time. The kiss left a mark on her cheek, Timur saw it, and the architect fled, in some versions escaping from the top of a minaret. Ever since, the story goes, women in Samarkand have worn veils. It is a legend, and historians link the name to the queen’s madrasah and mausoleum across the street, where her tomb is believed to lie.

Visiting

Combine it with the Bibi-Khanym Mausoleum opposite and the Siab Bazaar next door. The portal is impressive from the pedestrian street at any hour, and the dome is lit in the evening.