A HISTORY OF INNER ASIA

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128 A history of Inner Asia Ulugh Beg soon revealed where his main interests lay when by 1420 he built a remarkable madrasa in Samarkand.It was one of three such schools erected by him: of the other two the first was in Bukhara (built in 1417), the second in Gijduvan (also spelled Ghijduvan, Ghijduwan, Gizhdavan, etc.; for the sake of consistency, we shall always use the form Gijduvan), a locality to the northeast of Bukhara (built in 1433). Madrasas, as we have said, were the highest institutions of learning in the Islamic world, a counterpart to Europe’s universities, but their main mission was to train theologians and legal experts; the exact sciences were either absent or had a minor place in their curricula.Ulugh Beg’s madrasa in Samarkand, however, became a famous center of mathematics and astronomy.Like some of our modern institutions, it had a real astronomical observatory, which was built by the Timurid prince on the outskirts of the city in 1428 at a place called Kuhak (“Hill”) – in Tajik and Chopanata in Uzbek. Before giving full vent to his temperament as a scholar and patron of scholars, however, Ulugh Beg tried his hand at military campaigns against his neighbors: a quite devastating one against the Chaghatayid Shir Muhammad, Khan of Moghulistan in 1424, and another against the Juchid Baraq, Khan of the Golden Horde, in the Dasht-i Kipchak in 1427.The latter war turned out to be a disaster, and Ulugh Beg barely escaped alive.This defeat was a blessing in disguise, for the prince henceforth gave up war and politics, for which he had inherited none of his grandfather’s genius, and took up science, to his own benefit and that of the world of learning. The main importance of the Samarkand madrasa lay in the scholarly activities taking place there, but it was remarkable also as a building.Its general structure is that of most madrasas: a rectangular complex of buildings enclosing a courtyard, with cells for students, one or more lecture halls, and a mosque as the essential components.Ulugh Beg’s madrasa is distinguished for its spacious ground plan (81m by 56m), its location on the Rigistan or main square of Samarkand, and the complexity and wealth of its specific features and decorations.It faces the square with an imposing pishtak or entrance facade; the visitor passes through a front hall into one of the four lecture rooms located on each of the four sides of the school; if he proceeds farther, he enters the square courtyard (30m on each side), which he can cross in order to reach the lecture room at the end of the structure and, behind it, the mosque; the latter is an elongated prayer room (22m by 8m).The courtyard is lined by two floors of fifty units of living quarters for students and
Timur and the Timurids 129 faculty, for this madrasa, like most others, also functioned as a boarding school.Each unit, apparently housing two students, consisted of a closet, a bedroom, and a living room.At each of the four corners of the entire complex stood a minaret.The walls are decorated with several types of tiles and bricks of exquisite design and workmanship.The school also had a hammam (bath) noted for its beautiful mosaics.Finally the inscriptions adorning the building, some bearing Ulugh Beg’s name, others making such statements as “The search for knowledge is every Muslim’s duty,” deserve attention. The school’s main interest of course rests on the accomplishments of the scholars whom Ulugh Beg gathered there.It included such mathematicians and astronomers as Kadizade Rumi, a Turk from Bursa, Ghiyath al-din Kashi, a Persian from Kashan, and Ali Qushchi, a Central Asian Turk and thus the prince’s compatriot.Both the origins and eventual destinies of these people are revealing for the cosmopolitan intellectual climate then prevailing in the Dar al-Islam.The community could achieve brilliant results in the exact sciences that still matched those of contemporary Europe, if it was stimulated by an inspired sponsor like Ulugh Beg.Without such support, however, scientists had little institutional framework within which to develop and flourish. Moreover, in Central Asia they had to compete not only with conventional learning represented by the madrasa as a theological seminary, but also with a rising tide of religious fervor that found its growing institutional framework in the form of a new Sufi order, the Naqshbandi tariqa of dervishes.After Ulugh Beg’s time, it was the latter – about whom more will be said below – who set the intellectual tone in their society.This is also reflected by the example of Ali Qushchi: the noted mathematician left Samarkand for Tabriz and ultimately was invited to Istanbul by another enlightened sponsor, the Ottoman sultan Mehmet the Conqueror. The achievements of the Samarkand group are intimately linked with the aforementioned observatory, about which a few words should be said as well.First of all, it must be emphasized that we are dealing with the period before the invention of the telescope (Galileo was the first to use this instrument in 1609).Secondly, the Samarkand observatory had by the nineteenth century so completely disappeared that only archeological excavations undertaken in 1908 managed to identify its location and unearth its extant portion.Subsequent study has led to the partial reconstruction of a giant quadrant whose segment measured 40.2 meters; it was aligned along the meridian with its southern segment consisting of
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A HISTORY OF INNER ASIA svat soucek
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Contents List of maps pagevii Prefa
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Maps 1 Inner Asia: principal politi
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Preface This book is an attempt to
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Preface xi Population: (approximate
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Preface xiii in the early Middle Ag
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2 A history of Inner Asia Mongolia,
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4 A history of Inner Asia An Histor
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10 A history of Inner Asia Emirate
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12 A history of Inner Asia If we le
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16 A history of Inner Asia streams,
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18 A history of Inner Asia lasting
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20 A history of Inner Asia extermin
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22 A history of Inner Asia Kazakhst
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24 A history of Inner Asia in contr
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26 A history of Inner Asia to be ca
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28 A history of Inner Asia the Dash
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30 A history of Inner Asia is that
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34 A history of Inner Asia Moscow b
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36 A history of Inner Asia Ayatulla
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38 A history of Inner Asia (d.1166)
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40 A history of Inner Asia of the d
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42 A history of Inner Asia managed
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44 A history of Inner Asia among th
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chapter one The beginnings To most
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48 A history of Inner Asia ways: a
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50 A history of Inner Asia armies o
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To the Arctic Ocean Kök Turkic Emp
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58 A history of Inner Asia Khurasan
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60 A history of Inner Asia man amon
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64 A history of Inner Asia appointi
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66 A history of Inner Asia movement
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68 A history of Inner Asia for almo
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chapter three The Samanids The Arab
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72 A history of Inner Asia Turkic g
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74 A history of Inner Asia the Saha
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76 A history of Inner Asia Ilig (al
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178 A history of Inner Asia Bukhara
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184 A history of Inner Asia of Iran
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SIBERIAN RUSSIA R U S S I A Omsk Or
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chapter eighteen Central Asia becom
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256 A history of Inner Asia power a
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258 A history of Inner Asia as it d
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260 A history of Inner Asia of 1917
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Sinkiang (Chinese Turkestan) RUSSIA
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272 A history of Inner Asia In 1941
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Omsk Troitsk RUSSIAN FEDERATION RUS
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UZBEKISTAN KYRGYZSTAN Syr Darya Riv
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Uzbekistan Syr Darya Aral Sea (Kaza
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282 A history of Inner Asia for ass
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284 A history of Inner Asia growing
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290 A history of Inner Asia border
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292 A history of Inner Asia Coopera
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Amur Railroad Moscow-Beijing via Ul
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302 A history of Inner Asia multipa
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304 A history of Inner Asia A signi
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312 A history of Inner Asia The pro
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314 A history of Inner Asia Sinkian
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Appendix 1 dynastic tables This sec
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318 Appendix 1 13.Hasan (1130-32),
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320 Appendix 1 (d) Anushtiginids, o
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322 Appendix 1 21.Qazan (1343-46),
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324 Appendix 1 Timurid (non-Genghis
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326 Appendix 1 x.Yar Muhammad 1.Jan
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328 Appendix 1 25.Abu l-Ghazi III (
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330 Appendix 1 7a.Qilich Burhan al-
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332 Appendix 2 Kazakh Muslims were
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334 Appendix 2 Currency: The som; i
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336 Appendix 2 Religion: Historical
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338 Appendix 2 Sinkiang (Sinkiang U
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340 Appendix 2 Dundgov (Mandalgov);
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342 Select bibliography Barthold, W
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344 Select bibliography Aitmatov, C
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346 Select bibliography Bennigsen,
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348 Select bibliography Language Pl
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350 Select bibliography Istoriya Ka
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352 Select bibliography Mackenzie,
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354 Select bibliography Semenov, A.
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356 Select bibliography Bayhaqi, Ab
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358 Select bibliography Arends (Mos
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Abbasids, second dynasty of caliphs
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362 Index constitution, Soviet, 283
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364 Index Kaufman, Konstantin Petro
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366 Index Pamir Boundary Commission
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368 Index Togan, Zeki Velidi, Bashk
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A HISTORY OF INNER ASIA

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