ISMAIL SAMANI MAUSOLEUM

The Samanid mausoleum had long lain forgotten at the bottom of a cemetery. When the archaeologist Chichkine discovered it in 1930, during the construction of Samani Park, it was drowned among other tombs, buried under several meters of earth, which spared it the ravages of successive invasions and a thousand years of history. Today, the necropolis has disappeared, but a park has been laid out and a basin dug to restore it to its original configuration. Here, Uzbeks venerate the founder of one of Central Asia's most prestigious dynasties.

The Pearl of the Orient bears witness to Bukhara's golden age. Built in the early ^10th century by Ismail Samani for his father Akhmad, this dynastic tomb is the second oldest mausoleum in the Muslim world. Its precise dating would suggest that the tradition of building mausoleums for Muslim dynasties began here, or in Iraq, with the tomb of the Caliph Al Mountasir. Its architecture retains a Sogdian influence, but incorporates construction techniques that were revolutionary for the time. Its dimensions are not large (10.8 × 10.8 m). The total height, including the lantern, is 15 meters, and the walls are 1.8 m thick.

The mausoleum is conceived as a symbolic representation of the universe: a cube with four identical facades, symbolizing earth and stability, is topped by a semi-spherical dome, a Sogdian representation of the universe. Above the door, note the representation of a circle within a square: the Zoroastrian symbol of eternity. Decorative techniques using bricks, assembled in groups of four or five in different orientations, were an innovation that influenced subsequent centuries. There are 18 different combinations. Its proportions and decorative motifs are based on the principle of the dynamic square, an architectural innovation that gives the whole a power and harmony rarely equalled.

Depending on the position of the sun, the interplay of bricks gives the monument a changing, shifting appearance, despite its sober form. The builders used fired brick, cemented with egg yolk and camel's milk. Traditionally, pilgrims walk three times around the mausoleum, reciting prayers. So do some tourists, for it is said that if you vow to return to Bukhara... your wish will come true!