This south view of the upper passage chamber, or <em>chartak</em>, in the Shah-i Zindah necropolis in Samarkand is from the archeological part of <em>Turkestan Album</em>. The six-volume photographic survey was produced in 1871-72 under the patronage of General Konstantin P. von Kaufman, the first governor-general, in 1867-82, of Turkestan, as the Russian Empire’s Central Asian territories were called. The album devoted special attention to Samarkand’s Islamic architecture, such as 14th- and 15th-century monuments from the reign of Tamerlane and his successors. Of particular note is Shah-i Zindah (Persian for “living king”), revered as a memorial to Kusam-ibn-Abbas, a cousin of the Prophet Muhammad. The Burunduk mausoleum, apparently built in the 1380s, commemorates one of Tamerlane’s leading military commanders. This chartak--a square chamber with a passageway through arches—was built around 1405 and is the third in the necropolis ensemble. The monumental arch creates a niche for the secondary arch of the passageway, and the vibrant ceramic ornamentation on the facade serves as a frame for the cluster of shrines adjacent to the Kusam-ibn-Abbas mausoleum. Above the arch point is an Arabic inscription in the block Kufic style. Visible through the chartak is the Khodzha Akhmad mausoleum. To the right is a small minaret, built perhaps as early as the 11th century.
<br>Archaeological sites; Islamic architecture; Photographic surveys; Sepulchral monuments; Shāh-i Zindah; Tombs
Bogaevskii, Nikolai V., 1843-1912
between 1865 and 1872 <div style="display: none;">date QS:P571,+1850-00-00T00:00:00Z/7,P1319,+1865-00-00T00:00:00Z/9,P1326,+1872-00-00T00:00:00Z/9</div>
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<ul><li>Gallery: <a rel="nofollow" class="external free" href="http://www.wdl.org/en/item/3689/">http://www.wdl.org/en/item/3689/</a></li></ul>