Саманидтер мазары: Бухара архитектурасының ескерткіші

Mausoleum in Bukhara, Uzbekistan

The Samanid Mausoleum is a mausoleum located in the northwestern part of Bukhara, Uzbekistan, just outside its historic center. It was built in the 10th century CE as the resting place of the powerful and influential Islamic Samanid dynasty that ruled the Samanid Empire from approximately 900 to 1000. It contained three burials, one of whom is known to have been that of Nasr II. The mausoleum is considered one of the iconic examples of early Islamic architecture The Samanids established their de facto independence from the Abbasid Caliphate in Baghdad and ruled over parts of modern Afghanistan, Iran, Uzbekistan, Tajikistan, and Kazakhstan. It is the only surviving monument from the Samanid era, but American art historian Arthur Upham Pope called it "one of the finest in Persia". some reference Ismail's father, Ahmad, The reason for this later attribution is the lintel with inscribed Kufic script with his name

The erection of memorial mausoleums at first categorically contradicted some of the norms of Islam, but this prohibition was first violated by the "permitted" construction of the first Muslim mausoleum Kubba as Sulabiya over the tomb of the Arab caliph al Muntasir (861 862), in which two other caliphs were later buried: al Mu'tazz (866 869) and al Muhtadi (869 870), after which the erection of mausoleums began in all the Islamized countries of the Middle and Near East that were part of the Arab Caliphate. The mausoleum of the Samanids, a dynasty of Transoxiana rulers, was no exception. During the Middle Ages, this and other mausoleums that have not survived to this day were located within the large necropolis of the Samanid dynasty. With the fall of the dynasty (999) the area of the necropolis was gradually reduced, the mausoleums were destroyed, and in the XVI XVIII centuries on its territory began to build urban residential neighborhoods. In the early Middle Ages the area of the necropolis was called Naukanda, later Chahar gumbazan (four domes), and in the late Middle Ages Bahadur biy, and the Samanid mausoleum was considered the mazar of Ismail Samani. The mausoleum was first explored in 1924 by the expedition of Moisei Yakovlevich Ginzburg. At the same time the plan of the building was taken. In 1925, the scientific secretary of the Bukhara Commission for the Protection of Monuments of Antiquity and Art Musa Saidjanov organized the restoration of the facing of the dome of the building. During further archaeological research excavations of Vasiliy Vyatkin, conducted in 1926 1928, it was found out that inside the necropolis there were several burials, including Ismail Samani himself. At the same time it was found out that the necropolis building stands on the ruins of an even older one, probably somehow connected with the solar myths. In 1928 1930, partial restoration of the mausoleum was carried out by P. S. Kasatkin and N. M. Bachinskiy.

The monument marks a new era in the development of Persian and Central Asian architecture, which was revived after the Arab conquest of the region. Many researches noted that the structure is made similar to the open, four arched, often square in shape, Zoroastrian fire temples from Sassanian Iran, The building's shape is cuboid, like the Kaaba structure of the Great Mosque of Mecca in Saudi Arabia, while heavy fortress like corner buttresses are derived from Sogdian traditions of Central Asia. The synthetic style of the tomb is reflective of the 9th and 10th centuries – a time when the region still had large populations of Zoroastrians in their early stages of conversion to Islam. Elaborate baked brick decoration is unique in its level of detail and rhythmic patterns and combines multi cultural decorative motifs (Sogdian, Sassanian, Persian, Arabic, Antique). However, the building architects went beyond simply appropriating existing traditions in building structure and decoration; they introduced new features symbolic for the monumental dynastic architecture. In its structure, Mausoleum's unknown architects used squinches, containing four interior arches and an octagonal structure, that allowed to redistribute the weight of the circular dome over a square base, an alternative to pendentives. Overall, the building is constructed in a form of a small, slightly tapering cube, with each side approximately 31 feet (9 m) long. corner columns, classical in design,

Builders used baked brick of various rectangular and square sizes for both structural and decorative elements of the building. Large bricks formed large bands throughout the building for structural stability, smaller bricks were used for decoration, usually in blocks of two to five bricks. Baked brick was a known material in the region, yet such extensive and creative use is considered unprecedented. Local builders mostly used unbaked brick, stucco and wood as these materials were cheaper, but not as strong as baked brick. The Mausoleum uses a few stucco and wood elements but these are minimal in terms of their relative share in the construction process. A few bounding compounds were discovered during the excavations, alabaster being one of them. It is interesting that due to Islamic restrictions on use of imagery, Samanid Mausoleum decoration in mostly geometric in its layout and patterns, in comparison with the pre Islamic Central Asian building traditions that blended architecture, sculpture and painting. Repeated patterns create calculated harmony and a sense of infinity, important for a funerary structure. Patterns of great variety, executed in baked brick include basketweave, The symbols on the walls of the Samanid mausoleum form a complex geometric composition, consisting of embedded squares and a central circle, which are a specific type of Buddhist Manichaean mandala and can be considered as symbols of Buddhism. It is believed that the overall layout of the mausoleum, when viewed from above, is an exact reproduction of a Buddhist Manichaean mandala.

According to legend, Ismail Samani, known to the people of Bukhara as Hazrat Sultan, continued to rule the country even after his death. People seemed to genuinely believe in this legend because long after his death, they would still lower written requests through an opening on the southern side of the mausoleum, hoping to receive a response on the following day. Supposedly, the response would appear on the northern side of the mausoleum. According to another legend, Ismail Samani later relinquished his rule after two visitors attempted to deceive him in the mausoleum. However, until the early 20th century, a superstition persisted that if you wrote a plea for mercy and placed it at the foot of the grave, your request would be granted, and the response, if made by a righteous person with genuine faith, could be received in written form.