Timur builds the Friday mosque of Samarkand (Bibi-Khanym)
Back from his Indian campaign, Timur laid the foundations of a great Friday mosque in Samarkand in May 1399. Largely built within five years by craftsmen gathered from the conquered lands, with a courtyard enclosed by four iwans and a dome some 40 metres high, it was one of the largest mosques of the Islamic world; it is known as Bibi-Khanym, after Timur's senior wife.
- Date
- May 1399 – between 1404 and 1405start: month known; end: exact date unknown: an interval is given · duration: ≈ 6 years
- Place
- Bibi-Khanym Mosque, Samarkandtoday: Samarkand, Uzbekistan · Central and Northern Asia
- Participants
- Timur, Timurid Empire
- Threads
- Central Asia and the Steppe (14th – mid-15th c.)
- Also known as
- Bibi Khanum Mosque; Bibi-Khanum; Friday Mosque of Samarkand; Masjid-i Jami; Биби-Ханум; Соборная мечеть Тимура
Timur returned to Samarkand from India in 1399 and ordered a congregational mosque worthy of his capital. According to the court historians, its foundations were laid in Ramadan 801 AH (May 1399); stonemasons from Azerbaijan, Fars and India worked on the site, and 95 elephants brought from India hauled the stone. Timur chose the site himself and, to speed the work, put princes and amirs in charge of its different sections; he watched the building for only a few months before leaving on a new campaign in the west, and the work went on without him.
The mosque followed the plan with four iwans around a courtyard. Its outer walls enclose an area of about 167 by 109 metres; an entrance portal some 35 metres high leads into the court, opposite which rises the main sanctuary under a double-shelled dome — about 40 metres high outside and 30 metres inside — while two smaller domed halls face each other across the court. Galleries resting on more than 400 marble columns surrounded it, and in its centre now stands a huge marble Quran stand, made for Timur's grandson Ulugh Beg, whose name it bears, and moved out of the sanctuary in 1875.
When Timur came back in 1404 the mosque was almost complete, but he was displeased with the work and at once had it altered — according to the Castilian envoy Clavijo, the entrance portal. Some scholars (E. Paskaleva, 2023) think the mosque was finished only under his successors, probably by his grandson Ulugh Beg. The haste and the scale told: within a few years bricks began to fall from the great dome, the building slowly decayed into a ruin, and the inner arch of the portal collapsed in the earthquake of 1897; restoration began in 1974. The popular name Bibi-Khanym, ‘the elder princess’, recalls Timur's senior wife Saray Mulk Khanum, whose madrasa stood opposite and whose mausoleum survives; legend credits the building to her.
Connections
Related events
- Rise and campaigns of TimurApril 1370 – between 17 February and 19 February 1405 · Central and Northern AsiaTimur began the mosque after his Indian campaign, using elephants brought from India, and altered it on his return from the west in 1404
- Timur sacks Delhibetween 16 December and 17 December 1398 – between 31 December 1398 and 1 January 1399 · South AsiaAccording to Sharaf al-Din Yazdi, Timur took stonemasons from Delhi to build the congregational mosque of Samarkand
Same participants
- Shaybani Khan destroys the Timurid Empire1500 – 27 May 1507 · Central and Northern Asiavia Timurid Empire
Same place
- Qutayba ibn Muslim conquers Transoxiana705–715 · Central and Northern Asia
- The rise of the Samanids in Transoxiana819–900 · Central and Northern Asia
- The Kara-Khanid Khanate splits into western and eastern khanatesbetween 1040 and 1042 · Central and Northern Asia
- Battle of Qatwan9 September 1141 · Central and Northern Asia
- Siege of SamarkandMarch 1220 · Central and Northern Asia
Meanwhile in the world
Other regions, within a year of this event
Western and Central Europe
- Western Schism20 September 1378 – 11 November 1417
- Hundred Years’ War24 May 1337 – 19 October 1453
Africa
- Great Zimbabwe, the stone capital of a Shona kingdom1200–1299 – c. 1450
South Asia
- Timur sacks Delhibetween 16 December and 17 December 1398 – between 31 December 1398 and 1 January 1399
North America
- Hohokam great houses and the collapse of the canal townsc. 1300 – c. 1450
- Cahokia is abandonedc. 1300 – c. 1400
- Mississippian centres after Cahokia: Moundville, Etowah and the Southeastern Ceremonial Complexc. 1200 – c. 1450
Latin America
- Paquimé (Casas Grandes) at its heightc. 1300 – c. 1450
- Mayapan, capital of Postclassic Yucatán1220s – between 1441 and 1461
- The Kingdom of Cusco: the Inca state before the empirec. 1200 – c. 1438
- Chimor: the Chimú kingdom and its capital Chan Chanc. 900 – c. 1470
The same period
Sources
- Wikipedia (English): Bibi-Khanym Mosque
- Wikipedia (English): Timurid architecture
- Wikipedia (English): Samarkand
- Wikipedia (Russian): Мечеть Биби-Ханым
- Wikipedia (uz): Bibixonim jome masjidi
- Paskaleva E. Samarqand's Congregational Mosque of Bibi Khanum as a Representation of Timurid Legitimacy and Rulership // Manazir Journal. — 2023. — Vol. 5. — P. 59–87. — DOI 10.36950/manazir.2023.5.4.
- Golombek L., Wilber D. The Timurid Architecture of Iran and Turan. — Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1988.