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Panjob Madrasa, Samarkand

A one-storey Shia madrasa of 1889 on Firdavsi street in Samarkand's Panjob quarter, the heart of the city's Iranian community.

Ensembles1889

About the place

Panjob, Persian for "five waters", is a district of Samarkand where many of the city's Central Asian Iranians live. The madrasa was built here in 1889 by Khoja Abdurahim, a local builder and merchant, and until the 1920s taught both religious and secular subjects. It is no longer a school.

Khoja Abdurahim built a whole complex around it: the Panjob Shia Friday mosque next door, on the site of an older mosque, a teahouse, a pool and a bathhouse whose plan he brought back from Mashhad after a pilgrimage to Iran. A large Iranian Shia cemetery lies just east of the madrasa.

Why go

  • Centre of Samarkand's Iranian Shia community
  • Part of a complex with a Friday mosque and bathhouse
  • Built by a local merchant-architect in 1889

Sources (4)

  1. 1.Wikidata
  2. 2.ru.wikipedia.org
  3. 3.uz.wikipedia.org
  4. 4.openstreetmap.org

Nearby

  • Panjob MosqueEnsembles

    Under 1 km away

    Panjob Mosque

    A working Shia Friday mosque of the 19th century in Samarkand's Panjob quarter, home to the city's Iranian community; one of few in Central Asia.

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