Bibi-Khanym Mosque

Timur returned from his sack of Delhi in 1399 with enormous wealth, craftsmen and, according to chroniclers, ninety-five elephants used to haul stone. He ordered a congregational mosque that would surpass every other in his empire. Architects and builders from Iran, Azerbaijan, India and Khorezm worked on it, and Timur reportedly supervised the work himself, ordering the portal to be rebuilt higher when he found it too low.

The plan is a vast rectangular courtyard surrounded by galleries, with three domed halls: the main sanctuary opposite the entrance and two smaller domed mosques on the sides. The entrance portal and the main sanctuary portal are among the tallest ever built in Central Asia, and minarets stood at the corners.

Speed and ambition came at a price. Cracks appeared soon after completion; within a few decades bricks were falling from the vaults, and worshippers avoided the building out of fear. Later rulers used it less and less, and by the 19th century it was a ruin. The strong earthquake of 1897 brought down much of the main dome and the gallery.

Restoration began in Soviet times and accelerated in the 1970s and again after independence. The main portal, the domes and large parts of the facades were rebuilt; the side mosques were restored, and the courtyard was replanted. Look closely and you will see the difference between original fragments, with their faded mosaic, and the new tilework. The sheer scale is still overwhelming.

In the middle of the courtyard stands a huge lectern (lauh) of carved grey marble, made in the time of Ulugbek to hold a giant Quran. Local tradition says that a woman who crawls under it will have many children, and you may see women doing so. Some accounts say the stand once held the famous Quran of Caliph Uthman, now kept in Tashkent.

The mosque is named after Saray Mulk Khanum, Timur’s senior wife, whose title was Bibi-Khanym (“lady queen”). The most famous legend says that she ordered the mosque as a surprise for Timur’s return, and that the architect, in love with her, would finish it only if she allowed him a kiss. The kiss left a mark on her cheek, Timur discovered it, and the architect fled, by some versions flying away from the top of a minaret. Historians note that Timur himself ordered the mosque, but the story is part of every guide’s tour.

Across the street is the mausoleum of Bibi-Khanym, a domed tomb over a crypt traditionally associated with Saray Mulk Khanum and other women of the dynasty.

The mosque is on Tashkent Street, the pedestrian street that leads north-east from the Registan, about 15 minutes’ walk. A ticket is required for the courtyard and halls. Morning is the best time to see the main portal in good light, and the courtyard is pleasant in the shade of its trees. Combine it with Siab bazaar next door, the Hazrat Khizr mosque on the hill beyond and Shah-i-Zinda a few minutes further.

Walk around the outside of the complex as well as through the courtyard. On the side facing the bazaar you can see original sections of the walls, where the brickwork and remains of tile patterns survive, next to rebuilt stretches. The side mosques, smaller than the main sanctuary, have restored domes with ribbed and patterned tiles. Inside the main hall the scale of the space is easiest to feel: look up into the restored dome and imagine it without modern reinforcement.

Bibi-Khanym influenced mosque design across the Timurid world and beyond. Its combination of a huge courtyard, monumental portals and domed halls on the main axes became a model for later congregational mosques, including the Kalyan mosque in Bukhara, which you can compare with it if you travel on.

Opposite the main portal, across Tashkent Street, stands the mausoleum of Bibi-Khanym. Siab Bazaar is next door, and the Hazrat Khizr mosque rises on the hill beyond the road. Shah-i-Zinda is a ten-minute walk to the east.