Region

Samarkand

Timur's capital and the most photographed place in Central Asia. Roughly 2,750 years of continuous settlement, and an ensemble of tiled monuments that no other city on the Silk Road can match.

Administrative centre: Samarkand
Area: 16,770 km²

The Registan at night
Shah-i-Zinda
Gur-e Amir by night
The Afrasiyab murals
Ulugbek's Observatory
Samarkand in colour, around 1911
The Registan in the morning
The melon seller, Samarkand, around 1911
The Bibi-Khanym Mosque
Shah-i-Zinda, the upper group
Shashlik, ready for the grill
Samarkand plov
Samarkand non for the road
Market stalls in Samarkand, 1918

What to see

The Registan
Three madrasahs facing one square, built across three centuries.
Directions
Shah-i-Zinda
A narrow avenue of tombs, each façade tiled by a different workshop.
Directions
Ulugh Beg's Observatory
The surviving arc of a 15th-century sextant cut into bedrock.
Directions
Gur-e Amir
Timur's family tomb under a ribbed turquoise dome, forerunner of the great Mughal mausoleums.
Directions
Bibi-Khanym Mosque
Timur's Friday mosque, raised after his Indian campaign and once among the largest in the Islamic world.
Directions
Imam al-Bukhari Memorial Complex
The resting place of Imam al-Bukhari, compiler of the most trusted collection of hadith, at Hartang near Samarkand.
Directions

What to see

The Registan

Shah-i-Zinda

Ulugh Beg's Observatory

Gur-e Amir

Bibi-Khanym Mosque

Imam al-Bukhari Memorial Complex

Read alongside