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Iron Gate and Darband Wall

The narrow Buzgala gorge west of Boysun, the Silk Road's Iron Gate described by Xuanzang around 630, with remains of a wall of the 1st–3rd centuries.

Archaeology1st century

About the place

The Iron Gate is a narrow defile in the Baysuntau hills, about 17 km west of Boysun, through which the road from Samarkand to Termez and Bactria had to squeeze. The Chinese pilgrim Xuanzang described it around 630, and the name appears in Persian, Arabic and Turkic as Dari ohanin, Bab al-hadid and Temir qapigh. Locally the gorge is called Buzgalakhana.

Near the village of Darband, archaeologists traced a defensive wall that closed the valley in the 1st to 3rd centuries AD, in the Kushan period. Today the gorge is reached by road or from the Darband railway station. Allow about an hour to walk into the defile and look for the wall line on the slopes.

Why go

  • Gorge described by Xuanzang around 630
  • Kushan-era Darband wall
  • On the old road to Termez

Sources (2)

  1. 1.ru.wikipedia.org
  2. 2.en.wikipedia.org

Nearby

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  • Teshik-Tash CaveNature

    29 km away

    Teshik-Tash Cave

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