A Royal Mosque and Cemetery: the Hansaray Graveyard in Bahçesaray, the Capital of the Crimean Khanate

Abstract

This study is devoted to a discussion of the Hansaray graveyard, which faces the constant threat of imminent ruin. The inventory presented of the epitaphs of both the existent and now lost stones bear critical importance, particularly to historians and students of literature. Besides the text of the epitaphs, the formai qualities of the gravemarkers and their style are also exposed here for the first time in detail. The gravestones presented will serve to inform scholars of Turkic and Islamic art in their investigation into the cultural and artistic relations between the Crimea and Central Asia and between the Crimeans and the Ottomans. Hansaray in Bahçesaray constitutes the sole instance of a palace, mosque, and graveyard in the same complex. No cemetery or funerary monument is situated on the grounds of an Ottoman sultanic palace. So far as is known, this holds true also for all Turko-Islamic palaces. Exceptionally, however, the Shirvanshah Palace in Baku and the Ishak Pasha Palace in Doğubayezit in Anatolia include kumbets, or tomb structures with a pyramidal covering, in the palace compound. This cemetery, with its variety and diversity of styles and its rich repertoire of forms and ornamentation is a mirror of the cultural milieu of the Crimean Khanate. On the one hand, the tombs exhibit a faithfulness to Central Asian and ancient Turkic traditions and, on the other hand, the gravestones of the Giray dynasty are symbolic of their near affinity to Ottoman art. These tombs are the best examples of the close ties existing between the Crimean Khanate and the Ottoman Empire.