SHAKHRISABZ

Shakhrisabz is a small town situated not far from Samarkand. This town is famous as it is the birth place of Amir Timur. This great man even prepared a tomb for himself. But Tamerlane himself has never been buried there.
Timur was born on May 9th, 1336 in the aristocratic family in a small village 13km away from the ancient town Kesh. Later Amr Timur gave a new name to the town - Shakhrisabz - meaning "green town" (in tadjik). There are not so many monuments in Shakhrisabz, but all of them are of great historical importance. Timur made his summer residence Ark-Saray Palace there. It was a huge splendid palace, full of grandeur as his other palaces in Samarkand. Today there is almost nothing left from this enormous palace except two huge walls partly decorated with blue, white and gold mosaic tiling, that once were the parts of gigantic entrance. It took almost a quarter of a century to built this palace, but now we can only try to imagine its former beauty and grandeur. There are also several mosques built by Ulughbek, Timur's grandson. There is also the mausoleum of Sheikh Shamseddin Kulyal, spiritual teacher of Timur and probably his father is also buried there. Behind the mausoleum there is the crypt of Timur. Taking several steps down you get into a small stone room decorated only with quotations of Quran and with biographical inscriptions of Timur.