Sabbatical Notes: Professor Sören Stark on News from the Dīvār-i Kanpirak – the ‘Long Wall’ around Bukhārā

By Sören Stark
02/20/2014

During the 2013 field season of ISAW’s project studying the ‘long wall’ of Bukhārā, conducted in co-operation with the Institute of Archaeology at the Uzbek Academy of Sciences and co-directed by Prof. Sören Stark and Dr. Djamal Mirzaakhmedov, investigations were carried out in two different directions: Firstly, we continued stationary excavations at the site of Ganch-tepa, a mid-sized fortress at the southern bank of the Zerafshan. Secondly, the team resumed investigations at the oasis wall proper by excavating a profile across the oasis wall ca. 5 km west of Ganch-tepa.

As for Ganch-tepa this year’s field season substantially improved our understanding of the initial layout of the fortress and of its history between the fifth and the late eighth or early ninth century. We are now able to reconstruct the original fifth century CE building with a high degree of detail and certainty. Thus the fortress appeared in its first phase of existence (period one) as a compact and more or less symmetrical castle (called “kūshk” in Persian), with three rectangular towers separated by two curtain walls at each side. Over almost its entire facade sprawl rows of arrowslits in a checkerboard pattern. Most of these architectural features are well known from kūshk-castles of Sogdian aristocrats dating to the fifth century and thus confirm our initial dating of the first period of the fortress. However, Ganch-tepa is so far unique as it centers most likely in an open courtyard – and not in a central reception hall. This difference is perhaps due to the fact that the site represents a state fortress and not a fortified aristocratic mansion, which would make Ganch-tepa the first example of such a type of military architecture in Sogdiana. Important new data concern the further development of this fortress: Apparently it fell into disuse for at least several decades (perhaps during the period of Turkic suzerainty over Sogdiana after 558 CE), and was reconstructed and modified after 782 CE, that is already during Abbasid rule of Mawarannahr.

As for the ‘long wall’, there are several good indications to assume, that in this area (as opposed to the delta area further downstream) it was constructed only under the Abbasids (that is during period two of the neighboring border fortress). Taken together and put in context, these new data offer a new perspective on wall-building activities in Bukhārā and beyond during the early Abbasid period. A much more detailed report and analysis will appear shortly on my ISAW webpage.