Exploring Bukhara
“Salam Walekum,” said Santa Claus as he strode towards us and handed Little Rey a packet as a gift.
Little Rey studied the packet with some interest. He spotted a couple of chocolate bars peeking through the packaging.
We looked to Bekhruz, our guide, to see what to do next. Was this a gift or did we have to pay for it? He spoke a few words with Santa Claus, who was now busy adjusting his beard to cover his chin and told us to return the packet.
“They just put a couple of chocolates on top. But the rest may not be too good.”
By then, Little Rey had spotted a unique vehicle by the Ark Fortress and had lost interest in the packet. The vehicle was shaped like a small, covered cycle for four members in rows of two each with a small steering wheel for the person at the front left.
We promised him we’d come back and drive it and walked along our tour.
We were at Bukhara, one of the fabled cities of the ancient Silk Roads. In the Uzbek language — written in roman script — the city is called Buxoro as they roll the ‘a’ sound into an ‘o’. (Tashkent is locally called Toshkent, we learnt, though Samarkand was still Samarqand.)
According to some sources, the name Bukhara derives from the Sanskrit word ‘vihara’ or Buddhist Monastery. It’s not surprising, as in the pre-Islamic era, many religions jostled in trade centers like these. Bukhara was home to people following Zoroastrianism, Judaism, Buddhism, Nestorian Christians and many more which also traveled along the Silk Roads along with wares.
Though history textbooks in India only covered the Silk Roads perfunctorily, I had been fascinated with the ancient trade route once I started exploring history out of interest. The term Silk Roads though is a bit of a misnomer. It was coined by a German Geologist in the 19th century to cover one of the most active trading routes in history. It wasn’t a single road, and as our guide Bekhruz pointed out, silk wasn’t the most important commodity traded through the time it was active. Silk, spices, horses, slaves, pottery, and a variety of goods were traded between cities. It stretched from Western China to cities along the Mediterranean coast. No trader traveled all along the route though (it is estimated to have stretched over 8000 km across Asia). Most traveled to markets in cities that sprung up along the way. Samarkand and Bukhara owed much of their prosperity to the fact that they were about mid-way along the route.
(For those interested in learning more about this, I highly recommend Peter Frankopan’s excellent book — The Silk Roads.)
The Ark of Bukhara is a fortress that was initially built and occupied in the fifth century AD. Like many of the monuments here, it was built of baked brick. Also, like many of the structures, it has been reconstructed over its long lifespan. You can still spot remnants of the earlier structure on which the fortress has been built, along with digs where archeologists are excavating bits of history.
The Ark Fortress, like the rest of Bukhara, has also seen much violence over the centuries. Bukhara, in the 13th century, was part of the Khwarazmian empire which abutted areas that were conquered by Genghis Khan. Genghis Khan initially wanted to just have trade relations with the Shah who ruled the empire as he was busy with his battles in China. He sent an envoy to a local governor of the region. However, the governor had the envoy executed. Genghis Khan asked for the governor to be handed over to him to mete justice, but the governor came from the Shah’s mother’s tribe. Kinship won over pragmatism, and the Shah refused to placate Genghis Khan.
Genghis Khan turned his focus from China and, in a daring move, rode to Bukhara across a seemingly impassable desert to take the city by surprise. His armies laid waste to much of Bukhara, Samarkand, and a host of cities along the Silk Roads.
The city was rebuilt and was an important center under the Timurid dynasty (yes, that Timur Lane who’s deservingly much reviled in Indian history hails from this region. He is one of Uzbekistan’s local heroes as he conquered a large part of Central Asia and Middle East.)
The Ark houses the home of the erstwhile Emir and his throne room. Since the local population sat on the floor, the throne itself was a massive slab built at a height where the Emir sat on a carpet. The entry to the fortress has prison cells, a warning to people about their fate if they crossed the Emir.
Bukhara was a key area of interest for the British East India Company. They were concerned about the expansion of the Russan Empire in the 1830s and sent a colonel to enlist support of the Emir, but the colonel paid dearly for his arrogance in not understanding local customs. He rode into the Emir’s throne room on a horse (a taboo), presented his terms and turned his back while leaving (another gaffe). Enraged, the Emir imprisoned him in a dungeon and later threw a Captain sent by Queen Victoria to negotiate terms into the dungeon. Both were later executed with little reprisal from the British.
Bukhara was bombed by the Soviet Union in the 1920s to dispose of the last Emir of Bukhara.
Much, however, has been painstakingly rebuilt, often using historical references for the kind of designs and inscriptions the originals had. These reconstructions are everywhere in the city, and most sport the signature blue ceramic tiles and Islamic architecture.
Most of the monuments other than the ark are madrasahs (which were more like ancient universities), mosques and hanakas (resting places for Sufi saints). But peer closely, and you can spot how different influences intertwine to tell unique stories.
A little further along the way is the Nodir Devon Begi Madrasah. The story has it that the Devon (minister — dewan in Hindi) wanted to build a caravan serai at the location to make money. He invited the Emir to inaugurate the structure. Perhaps fearing the Devon was getting a little too rich, the Emir mentioned that he had built a wonderful Madrasah. Unable to counter his boss, the Devon spent the next couple of years converting the caravan serai to a Madrassah.
The Madrassah’s facade sports designs of the simurgh, a mythical bird from Persian history like the Phoenix.
Next to the Madrassah is a statue of a character beloved to the locals and one we had read about extensively in India: the wise but foolish Nasiruddin Hodja atop his donkey.
Many of Hodja’s stories embodies his Sufi thinking. A story I remember from childhood is where he goes to pay respects to an atheist at his funeral. Seeing his body draped in fineries, he remarks ‘All dressed up, and nowhere to go.’ It took me a while to fathom the wisdom of the statement. An atheist believes there is no heaven or hell, so whom did the man want to impress?
Another tale related by Bekhruz goes like this: An imam was bemoaning the pressures of his job, when Hodja remarked he could do it very easily. Irked, the Imam asked him to take over the lecture at the local mosque for the next three Fridays.
The first Friday, Hodja walked in and asked everyone, “Do you know what I’m going to speak about?”
“No,” said the puzzled audience.
“In that case, it doesn’t matter what I say,” said Hodja and walked out.
The next Friday, he repeated the question.
“Yes,” came the reply from the crowd.
“Since you already know it, I don’t need to say anything,” said Hodja and again walked out.
The third Friday, the crowd thought they’d get better of him. When he put the question, there was a section that answered yes and another that said no.
Unruffled, Hodja simply said, “Those who know, please explain to those who don’t” and walked out.
Stories like these, breezy to listen to, but laced with meaning, are what make Hodja much beloved as the wise fool.
As we walked along, we passed one of the regions oldest synagogues, and one of the oldest mosques.
Bekhruz was an excellent conversationalist, and we spoke about how finances worked along the Silk Roads. At first, the mercantile Sogdians, and later the Jews, helped finance merchants. The Jews had strong ties across regions and allowed merchants to deposit money at one city and withdraw at another with a receipt — sort of an early money transfer mechanism. They also loaned merchants with credit money for interest, something Muslims were prohibited from doing by their religion, but which kept trade ticking.
Many of the places have Madrassahs facing each other, though they may have been built at various times. An interesting one is the one built by Ulugh Beg, the grandson of Timur.
Ulugh Beg is a fascinating character. He was groomed to be a ruler from an early age. Timur brought the best of tutors from his sprawling empire for his grandson. Ulugh Beg fell in love with astronomy, science and arts, and devoted much of his time to encouraging these.
Ulugh Beg ascended the throne after Timur, but always had an uneasy equation with the clerics who thought he should spend more time promoting religion instead of arts and science.
During his reign, Ulugh Beg transformed the cities of Samarkand and Bukhara into key centers of learning. It is said that the Madrassah in Bukhara was constructed to placate powerful clerics.
This didn’t help much though. After 40 years of rule, Ulugh Beg was murdered by an assassin who was encouraged by clerics. The empire soon disintegrated after this.
We walked along to the famous Poi-Kalyan ensemble (pedestal of the Great Kalyan minaret) which houses a Madrassah and mosque facing each other and the Kalyan Minaret.
The Kalyan minaret is one of the iconic sights of the city and was famed in the past. While it served as a place to call out the Azaan for prayers, it also served as a sort of a lighthouse for the desert and a watch tower.
By now, the temperatures were dipping, and we decided to continue our tour the next day with another quick view of the minaret.
The next morning was misty with temperatures around -5-degree Celcius. Luckily, we had enough layers on, and spent some time at the minaret before going to the memorial complex of Khoja Naqshbandi, one of the most important Muslim shrines in the region.
Khoja Naqshbandi is revered as a person who brought Sufi wisdom to the masses. Unlike the Indian sub-continent where Sufiism is thought of as musical mysticism, local Sufis were not associated with music. Instead, the Khoja brought religion to the masses by asserting that you could work with your hands and yet hold God in your heart. This message was a contrast to having to understand God only through preaching, and won him many followers in the working class.
Our last stop was at the last Emir’s summer palace, built to impress his Russian and European friends. The Emir brought in craftsmen from Russia, and one can make out the opulence of the rooms and decorations. He, however, couldn’t enjoy the palace much as he was dethroned in just 4 years after its construction by the Soviet invasion.
Even by our standards, this was a lot of history to take in. Little Rey had been patient through most of the two days, and we yielded to his wish before we left Bukhara for Samarkand — we went back to the ark fortress for a quick ride on the covered cycle.
