THE REGISTAN

Sixty years ago, the Registan was the heart of Samarkand, and a compact and colourful crowd is competing around the numerous shops that proventriculus the madrasahs. The tireless Swiss traveller, Ella Maillard, had the opportunity, during his visit to Samarkand in 1932, to stay in the madrasas Tilla Kari, whose cells then hosted visitors to the. The Madrasas Shir Dor, for her part, served as a place of detention for basmatchi - Muslims opposed to Soviet Power - awaiting execution. Here, like around the Gour Emir, the houses were demolished to make clear. One might think of the decor of a deserted theatre: the huge three and beautiful Madrasahs Begh Begh, Shir Dor and Tilla Kari have a large empty square and on the fourth side, a little in retreat, are the seats that greet visitors during their lighting and light shows. In the th century, the six major arteries that left the city gates crossed at this location, on a vast place of sand, literally: . Not that the sand tapissât the whole place, but it was thrown in abundance to absorb the blood paid during the public executions. Timur wanted to facilitate trade and encourage merchants, who were paying heavy taxes, to come to Samarkand. He built a street lined with shops that crossed the city apart and a huge bazaar. Continuing his work, his wife, Tuman Aka, built a tim, a large covered market for domes. During the reign of Oulough Begh, at the beginning of the th century, the Registan became the official place for Samarkand. His new status was accompanied by a great deal of work, cutting the market to domes and building a madrasas, khanaka, caravanserai and mosque. It was on this square that public executions and all official demonstrations were held. It was also a strategic place and, at the end of the th century, the Ennemis volcanic ennemis, Babur, the last of the Timourids, had installed its staff at the top of madrasas of Oulough Begh, the real centre of the city.

In the th century, Samarkand was under the authority of the Bukhara khanate and lost the status of capital conferred on it by Timur. The monuments of the Registan, neglected, slowly fall into ruins. In the th century the governor of Samarkand, Yalangouch Bakhadour, gave prominence to his current aspect by building two new madrasahs on the location of caravanserai and khanaka. A painting of Vereshagin, a famous Russian painter, gives an image of the atmosphere in the late th century. In a work soberly called Tarjestélévisionouiout, one can see a crowd gathered in front of Madrasas Dor, admiring a dozen high pickets adorned with heads planted at their top. The restoration work started in the early th century closed and repaired the outrages of time and earthquakes. Today a new danger threatens these monuments: the remontées of the water table beset the bottom of their walls, and the remontées of water le the mâché paper which supports the decorations. Since the restoration, new seismic shocks have caused cracks that widen year in and year out, and regularly, scaffolding and metal tubes strengthen the structure of threatened monuments. Conservators will have to face new work so that the "place of sand" never deserves its name and, in fact, work takes place almost every day to ensure the survival of the monument. For the time being, the Registan remains the largest and most elegant architectural ensemble in the Islamic world and, according to Georges Curzon at the end of the th century, the entire world, «as no site, no Western city has on three sides of first-order Gothic cathedrals».

La Oulough Begh. The Madrasas Oulough Begh is the oldest of the three. Built between 1417 and 1420, it is recognisable to its northern minaret, slightly inclined, as if it were to support the sky, a role assigned to these two giant 33 m high minarets which flanking the portal and never greeted imams. The guides like to tell how, during the restoration, Russians tried unsuccessfully to rotate the minaret on its basis to give it right. The portal, decorated with a mosaic of carved bricks and enamelled bricks in the colours of the sky, is a huge vessel in the direction of the sky. Majoliques of majoliques, five- or ten-branch @, a few rare keys of yellow, green… look lost in this enchanting spatial geometry. Wings such as minarets are entirely covered with girikh, geometric motifs. Inside, about cells spread over two levels form a square courtyard. At the corners of the building, high court rooms were surmounted by domes now destroyed. In 1417, the madrasas of Oulough Begh was the largest university in Central Asia. More than pupils studied the Koran, but also astronomy, mathematics, philosophy and literature. The so-called "Plato of his time", Kazy-Zade-Rumi, came to teach astronomy there. Oulough Begh, enlightened governor, both mathematician, astronomer, poet and politician, also came in the yard of the madrasas arguing with the students. This openness to non-religious materials brought his death, his own son, allied to fanatical nuns, who killed him in 1449. " Owls had taken the place of students in these cells, and instead of silk curtains, their doors were strained with spiders'canvases. " The description dates back to 1711. At that time, the sumptuous Samarkand appeared to be dormant. The market, which took over the right of city in the centre of the city and entered the buildings, flooded the place du Registan with Detritus; brought by the wind, the sand also into and the level of the ground is mounted more than two meters! In 1873, Eugene Schuyller highlighted the dilapidated state of madrasas, which has only one floor, as well as the apparent optical illusion of minarets. It is in order to repair this "illusion" that the architects responsible for restoring monuments in the th century tried unsuccessfully to redress the right minaret. The bottom of the court is occupied by a mosque.

La Dor Dor. The Madrasas Dor Dor was built only two centuries later. At the beginning of the 1635 th century, Yalangtush Bakhadour, a vizier of Imam Kouli Khan and governor of Samarkand, probably wanted to awaken the sleepy city and left its imprint, destroyed what remained of caravanserai and khanaka and was built, between 1619 and, a madrasas on the other side of the square, in mirror with that of Oulough Begh. If the esthètes judge the Pure Dor Dor less pure in its proportions and ornaments, it is, however, that attracts the eyes when you arrive on the square of the. Its fire-lions-lions with a light portal as the sun come to respond to the starry vault of Madrasas D's:: the power of the sun facing the infinite of space. A legend tells us that the architect responsible for the construction of Shir Dor dies for violating the laws of Islam which prohibit figurative art. But the Sogdiane, which is the heart of Samarkand, has always been able to combine harmoniously the different religious and cultural influences it underwent. Some see in this lion-tiger the sun a allegorical representation of the power of Yalangtush Bakhadour, also referring to the symbolism of the zoroastrianism and the cult of fire. It was this lion-tiger that gave its name to madrasas: Shir Dor means "who wears the lion". The width of the two buildings is identical, but Madrasas Dor, built on the foundations of the ancient khanaka, is slightly lower than Madrasas Begh Begh. On each side of the portal, two domes in bulb au on the air relief coiffent the study rooms. Many inscriptions adorn the portal and drums of domes: " You are the great warrior, Yalangtush Bakhadour, if you add the numbers of your name, you get the date of the foundation. And also: " He raised a madrasas such as the earth was brought to the zenith of the sky. Or: " Never over the centuries, the clever acrobat of thought, by the string of fantasy, will reach the forbidden summits of minarets. " The inner Courtyard, entirely decorated with geometric motifs and green floral floral floral floral motifs, houses two floors of cells. Today students have been replaced by carpet sellers and suzani with the unquestionable commercial talents that paressent on the takhta or play cards, waiting for tourists. For a few hospitals, the gardien keeper will bring you up to the roof where the view plunges inside the courtyard.

The mosque Tilla Kari. In front of the stands, the Madrasas Tilla Kari, lower and the facade longer than the previous two, closes the north side of the place du Registan. On its left, the blue dome of the mosque distinguishes madrasas from its two neighbours. It is at this mosque that madrasas owes its name: Tilla Kari means'covered gold '. Just admire the stunning decorations of the interior of the dome to see that this nickname is entirely justified. The high portal and the two levels of cells are decorated with majoliques, interlaced floral motifs and solar symbols that echo the tones of the mosque Shir Dor. Yalangtush wanted to provide Samarkand with a Friday mosque worthy of its rank, that of Bibi Khanum being in ruins. He built a large deputy mosque in a madrasas, so that he could accommodate the greatest number of faithful in public ceremonies. La was built at the site of the caravanserai built under the Timourids, and whose foundations were preserved. The work lasted over 10 years, from 1646 to 1659, and the mosque was covered with gold. It is the youngest monument of the square and, probably, because of the imbalance created by the dome of the mosque at the angle of a facade of 120 m, the most surprising. Of the three madrasahs, it is the only one to have outward-looking cells, such as the Mir-i-Arab madrasas in Bukhara. The walls, the dome, the mihrab are entirely decorated with red and gold floral motifs on overseas blue background. The dome is particularly impressive, the concentric circles of gold leaves on a blue background seem killed le eyes. The ceiling is as flat as a table, but the decorations in the eye show it vaulted. Here too, students'cells and the adjoining halls of the mosque are home to souvenirs and antiques stores. However, a space was reserved to present photographs taken before and during the restoration. Between La Dor Dor and the Madrasas Tilla Kari stands the burial monument of the Dynastie dynasty, or dakhma of the Chaybanides. A simple cube cube covered with grey marble, he was once in the madrasas of Khan Chaybani.