Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 21.djvu/267

Rh S A M S A M 247 courts are surrounded by three stories of small rooms, each having only one opening the door. The majestic buildings are now merely the dwellings of mollahs, who live on the revenues of the Wakf lands at Katty-kurgan. The college of Shir-dar (built in 1601) takes its name from the two lions, or rather tigers, figured on the top of its doorway, which is richly decorated with green, blue, red, and white enamelled bricks. It is the most spacious of the three, and 128 mollahs inhabit its 64 apartments. The Tilla-kari ("dressed in gold"), built in 1618, has 56 rooms. But the most renowned of the three madrasahs is that of ,Ulug-beg, built in 1420 or 1434, by Timur, the grandson of the great conqueror. It is smaller than the others, but it was to its school of mathematics and astronomy that Samar- kand owed its wide renown in the 15th century. A winding street running north-east from the Righistan leads to a much larger square having the college of Bibi-khanym on the west, the graves of Timur's wives on the south, and a clean bazaar on the east. The college was erected in 1888 by a Chinese wife of Timur, and is said to have once sheltered as many as a thousand students. It covers a large area, and has three mosques connected by a quadrangular building containing the students' rooms. The archway and towers of its fa9ade are considered by Vambery as a model for such buildings, and its decorations resist the destructive influences alike of time and of man. One of its mosques still raises its high bulbed dome above the outer walls, which are falling into ruins, and now give accommodation to the carts and the bazaar of traders in cotton. The lofty ruins of the grave of Timur's wives are really grand. To the north, outside the walls of Samarkand, but close at hand, is the Hazreti Shah-Zindeh the summer-palace of Timur ; and near this is the grave of Shah-Zindeh, or, more precisely, Kotham ibn al-' Abbas ibn 'Abd al-Mottalib, a famous companion of the Prophet. This was already a famous shrine in the 14th century (Ibn Batuta, iii. 52) ; it is believed that the saint still lives in the mosque, and will one day rise for the defence of his religion. The Hazreti Shah-Zindeh covers a wide area on a terrace reached by forty marble steps. A series of galleries and rooms lead to the hall containing the relics of the saint. The decoration of the interior halls is marvellous. Another street running south-west from the Righistan leads to the Gur-Emir the grave of Timur. This consists of a chapel crowned with an elegant dome, enclosed by a wall and fronted by an archway. Time and earthquakes have greatly injured this fine building ; one of the minarets is already in ruins. The interior consists of two apartments paved with white marble, the walls being covered with elegant turquoise arabesques and inscriptions in gold. The chief room is of great beauty, and its decorations, of a bolder style than the others, are in strict harmony with the im- pression it is designed to produce. A large pyramidal piece of jade broken into two covers the grave of Timur, which has by its side that of his teacher, Mir Seid Berke, and those of several members of his family, all enclosed by a marble railing. A dark and narrow flight of steps leads down to the crypt, also ornamented with arabesques, where the graves are placed in the same order as in the upper hall. The citadel is situated on the west of the city, upon a hill whose steep slopes render it one of the strongest in Central Asia. Its walls, 3000 yards in circuit and about 10 feet high, enclose a space of about 4 square miles. It contained the palace of the emir of Bokhara, a vulgar modern building now transformed into a hos- pital, and the audience hall of Timur, a long narrow court, sur- rounded by a colonnade, and containing the Keuk-tash, a grey stone 10 feet long, 4 feet broad, and 4 feet high, reported to have been brought from Brussa. On it Timur used to take his seat, surrounded by his numerous vassals ; from it more recently the emirs of Bokhara also were wont to dispense their terrible justice. Ruins of former buildings heaps of plain and enamelled bricks, among which Graeco-Bactrian coins have been found cover a wide area all around the present city, and especially on the west and north. The name of Aphrosiab is usually given to these ruins, which extend for nearly three miles to the westward of the present Russian town ; this suburb of Samarkand was enclosed by a wall, the ruins of which can be traced for seven or eight miles. Five miles to the south-west of Samarkand is the college Khodja Akrar ; its flower ornamentation in enamelled brick is one of the most beautiful of Samarkand. Rye is now grown in its courts, and its artistic ornamentation is going to ruin. To the north-north-east are the Tchupan-ata Hills, the chief of which has on its summit the grave of Daniar Polvan. On the right bank of the Zerafshan stands the village of Dehbid, peopled by descendants of Mahkdum Aazam (died in 1542), who possess a beautiful khanka (monastery), with pretty avenues of trees planted by Nezr Divabeghi in 1632. As for the famous Baghitchi-naran (the garden of plane trees), only the ruins of its palace now mark its former position ; the trees have disappeared. Of the Graeco-Armenian library said to have been brought to Samarkand by Timur no traces have been discovered, and Vambery regards the whole legend as a fable invented by Armenians. Every trace of the renowned high school Kalinder- khany has also disappeared. The present Moslem city is an intricate labyrinth of narrow winding streets, having on both sides clay walls concealing dirty court-yards and miserable houses. The population was estimated at 36,000 in 1879 ; it consists of Tajiks (Iranians) and Sarts or Uzbegs. The Europeans numbered 5380. Some 300 Jews occupy a separate quarter, remarkable for its filth. Numbers of Arabs, Persians, Afghans, Hindus, Kiptchaks, and Tsigans (Gipsies) may be met with in the streets. The chief occupation of the inhabitants is gardening ; the gardens beyond the walls are extensive and very well kept. There is also a certain amount of manufacturing in- dustry ; the workshops, which are small, are thus enumerated by M. Kostenko : for metallic wares, 12 ; for tallow and soap, 34 ; tanneries, 30; potteries, 37; for various tissues, 246. Those for dyeing and the manufacture of harness, boots, and silver and gold wares are also numerous. The best harness, ornamented with turquoises, and the finer products of the goldsmith's art, are imported from Bokhara or Afghanistan. The products of local potteries are very fine. The bazaars of Samarkand, the chief of which is in the centre of the town, close by the Righistan, are more animated and kept with much greater cleanliness than those of Tashkend or Namangan. The trade carried on by local or Bokhara merchants is very brisk, the chief items being cotton, silk, wheat and rice, horses, asses, fruits, and cutlery. Wheat, rice, and silk are exported chiefly to Bokhara ; cotton to Russia, via Tashkend. Silk-wares and excel- lent fruits are imported from Shahri-Syabs, and rock-salt from Hissar. (p. A. K.) SAMBALPUR, or SUMBULPOOR, a British district in the chief-commissionership of the Central Provinces of India, between 21 2' and 21 57' N. lat. and between 83 16' and 84 21' E. long. Exclusive of attached native states by which it is surrounded, Sambalpur contains an area of 4521 square miles. Including the native states, it is bounded on the north by Chutia Nagpur, on the east and south by Cuttack district, Bengal, and on the west by the Bilaspur and Raipur districts. The Mahdnadi, which is the only important river in the district, flows through it, dividing it into unequal parts. The greater portion of Sambalpur is an undulating plain, with ranges of rugged hills running in every direction, the largest of which is the Bara Pahar, a mountain chain covering an area of 350 square miles, and attaining at Dibrigarh a height of 2267 feet above the plain. The Mahanadi affords means of water communication for 90 miles ; its principal tributaries in Sambalpur are the Ib, Kelii, and Jhira. To the west of the Mahanadi the district is well cultivated. The soil of the district is generally light and sandy. It is occupied for the greater part by crystalline metamorphic rocks ; but part of the north-west corner is composed of sandstone, limestone, and shale. Gold dust and diamonds have been found near Hirakhudd or Diamond Island, at the junction of the Ib and Mahdnadi. The climate of Sambalpur is considered very unhealthy ; its average temperature is 79, and its average annual rainfall is 58^ inches. The census of 1881 disclosed a population of 693,499 (346,549 males and 346,950 females). Hindus numbered 632,747 and Mohammedans 2966. The only town in the district with a population exceeding 5000 is SAMBALPUR, the administrative headquarters, with 13,939 inhabitants, situated in 21 27' 10" N. lat. and 84 1' E. long., on the north bank of the Mahanadi. It has much improved since 1864, when a cart could only with great difficulty pass through the main street. Of the total area of the district 1125 square miles are cultivated, and of the portion lying waste 888 are cultivable. Rice, forms the staple crop ; other pro- ducts are food grains, oil-seeds, cotton, and sugar-cane. The manu- factures are few and of no great value. The gross revenue in 1883 84 was 22,445, of which the land contributed 11,388. Sambalpur lapsed to the British in 1849, who immediately adopted a system of exaction and confiscation by raising the revenue assessments one-fourth and resuming the land grants, religious and others. Great dissatisfaction was the consequence, and the Brahmans, who form a numerous and powerful community, made an appeal, but obtained no redress. In 1854 a second land settlement again raised the assessments everywhere one-fourth. This system of exaction produced its natural results. On the outbreak of the mutiny in 1857 a general rising of the chiefs took place, and it was not until the final arrest of Surandra Sa, a chief who for some years had been the cause of great disturbances, in 1864 that tranquillity was restored ; since then the district has enjoyed profound peace.