A moonlit palace

The Khan’s Palace was enveloped in darkness, folk music started to play, and the evening guests of the ancient capital of the Crimean Khanate, Bakhchysarai, were waiting motionlessly. A gate to the past was opened on September 25 at the Bakhchysarai Historical-Cultural Preserve and a unique night excursion with elements of performance was launched.

The Khan’s Palace attracts to Bakhchysarai tourists from all over the world. Currently the museum staff has an interesting proposal for the most experienced travellers. Around 80 guests have come from all over the Crimea to take part in the new tour.

“Any kind of start is a huge step, one has to venture and find partisans,” the head of the Bakhchysarai Preserve Valerii NAUMENKO started the soiree, “Today we are opening a new page of the modern history of the Khan’s Palace. This tour is not aimed at recreation of all of its history, building the line of historical facts that are common knowledge – this is not the most important thing today. Most importantly, we should get imbued with the atmosphere of this amazing place where we have the honor and luck to be present. We want to understand whether one can change and improve, having preserved respect to our monument. We have been delaying the tour for a reason: it is important to start when darkness falls on the Khan’s Palace.”

Later on, the guests were divided into two groups. The first one immediately headed to the palace, and the second one had an opportunity to walk along the main square of the miniature city in the moonlight. In the 16th century it was the capital of the Crimean Khanate founded by Hac? I Giray, whom people called Melek (Angel). “Bakhchysarai’s intoxicating air is making the hearts drunk like the wine. This city is a legend. The minarets of the palace fly up to the sky...” – these lines started the tour near the mosque of the 16th century. Khan-Dzhami (Big Khan’s Mosque) is decorated with two 28-meter-high minarets. Illumination makes them look especially mysterious in the background of the starry sky. The Khan’s Lodge, where the khan used to pray, is located near the mosque, further there is a cemetery where Khanate rulers are buried. The tour does not include any visit to the cemetery. The group passes by the utility rooms, where the stable is located, passing by the snowhite marble fountains and famous Falcon Tower (Togan-Kulesi), about which the guide promised the tourists to tell later, keeping the intrigue.

Under the fall of the night lyrical stories about the Khan’s Palace are percieved especially deeply, it is hard to imagine them. A pearl necklace. Its color resembles the moon shining brightly above Bakhchysarai. Travellers often compared the palace with a necklace, because its objects surrounding the main square seem to be strung on a thin thread like beads. And the tourists, having seen every building and strung them on the thread of their imagination, approached the main entrance which leads to secret courtyards.

In the first courtyard ambassadors and diplomats were sitting on the benches, waiting for the reception. When their turn came, they entered through the portal of Iron Doors, or Aleviz Portal named after the Venice master Aleviz Friazin (Aloisio da Milano). The inscription on the portal is in Arab language glorifying the khan and reminds of the date the building was built: 909, Hijra in Muslim calendar, and 1503 – in Gregorian. The mighty doors are closed for the tours, and they enter the Divan Halls, where all political and economic issues were resolved, through an ordinary door located nearby. Music is playing in the Divan Hall, and to the guests’ surprise the khan and his son appear before their eyes. The ruler is strolling along the hall, waiting for the foreign ambassadors.

Having resolved all the state questions, one can have a rest in the rose garden. There the khan treated his foreign guests to coffee, observed goldfish in the pool and inhaled the aroma of the flowers. The excursion group went along the paths to the Summer Pavilion, in order to watch the garden from there, and again met the khan who enjoyed the night silence after fulfilling his duties.

Like honorable guests, the tourists are brought not to the ordinary, but the Small Palace Mosque, where only the khan and his close surrounding prayed. The main peculiarity of any mosque is the prayer niche mihrab, pointed to south, where the Muslim’s major shrine, Mekka, is located. In the mosque one could see a white robe of the pilgrim and old-time Koran.

Many legends in Bakhchysarai are connected with fountains. Two famous fountains stand near the mosque: the Gold Fountain built in 1733 and the Fountain of Tears built in 1764 and glorified by Alexander Pushkin in his poem Bakhchysarai Fountain.

What is the most interesting place to see in the palace? Probably the harem, a place which is often a subject to jokes, but scarcely known to contemporaries. Incidentally, people knew little about this place even in ancient times, because it was protected by a high fence and no traveller or historian was ever able to peep in here. The original word for harem is pronounced like “horam” and means a forbidden, preserve place with special rules of etiquette. People often make a mistake considering that harem is where a great number of women lives. In fact, only one wife resided in one harem, where she had her own rooms, places to stroll, and servants. A man was allowed to have only four harems, i.e., four wives. The rooms are luxurious. Painted tableware, handmade carpets, carved boxes and cupboards, as well as music instruments – everything a person needs for comfortable life.

Near the only harem which has been preserved there is the Falcon Tower, about which the guide promised to tell us at the beginning of the tour. Besides being a dwelling place for hunting falcons, the tower performed one more function. A woman from the harem could go upstairs and secretly watch what was going on in the city.

After the tour was over, the tourists heard a verse in Crimean Tatar, and full of inspiration and impression everyone rushed to the heart of the ancient city, where they saw the performance of the Crimean Tatar folklore ensemble Krym. The Crimean Khanate has existed for 342 years and its history lives on in this living preserve.

COMMENTARIES

Alie KHAMZINA, guide:

“Today we were not limited in time, therefore we were able to show the history of the Khan Palace the way we liked, because the palace is the only architecture monument of this kind, it has no analogues in the world.”

Aziz ABDULLAYEV, deputy head of the Council of Ministers of the Autonomous Republic of the Crimea:

“Our lives are full of fuss, the bustle is absorbing us. And beautiful and interesting history helps us look at the world in a new way and feel a part of this history, assess what is going on these days. You are interested to know: what was in my family? Where does my root come from? I think our task lies in integration of spirituality, culture, and respect among peoples. The Crimea needs this kind of approach to history. Incidentally, if groups are formed, the tours will be organized in Crimean Tatar language, too.”