r capital of Bukhara. Esmāʿīl's türbe, or mausoleum, the oldest Islāmic monument surviving in Bukhara, reproduces the form of the Zoroastrian (Zoroastrianism) chanar taq, or fire temple. In Sāmānid and Seljuqid hands, the türbe generally took the form of a small circular or octagonal building, roofed with a turret shaped like the point of a pencil. Mounted on a solid or single-vaulted substructure, its single chamber had a domed ceiling and a mihrab, or niche indicating the direction of Mecca. In the more elaborate türbes, the single door was framed with bands of geometric decoration, and the turret was sometimes ribbed.Ghaznavids and GhūridsAlp Tigin, a slave of Turkic origin at the Sāmānid court, escaped in AD 962 to Kābul, where he rapidly gained control of the town. He transferred his headquarters to Ghazna (Ghaznī) in central Afghanistan and established his dynasty there. Few Ghaznavid (Ghaznavid Dynasty) works of art have survived, but the admirably proportioned and decorated mortuary (tomb) towers at Ghazna are architectural achievements of great splendour. Still finer is the minaret of Jām, a Ghūrid (Ghūrid Sultanate) structure of the 11th century. Standing alone in a desolate region, it escaped discovery until 1957. It is conjectured that the minaret may mark the position of the lost Ghūrid capital of Fīİūzkūh.Seljuqs (Seljuq)The art of the Seljuqs, who founded kingdoms in Persia, eastern Byzantium, Syria, and Iraq, eclipsed that of the Sāmānids, Ghūrids, and Ghaznavids. They were great architectural patrons and constructed numerous mosques, madrasahs (Islāmic religious schools), hospitals, orphanages, baths, caravansaries, bridges, and türbes notable for their decorative masonry, elaborately ornamented portals, and use of Kūfic script as an architectural decorative device. The Seljuqs also attained a high standard in their decorative arts, especially metalwork, wood carving, and pottery. The Mongols, who terminated the Seljuq period, adopted certain Seljuqid artistic conventions, particularly the use of ornamented portals and glazed-tile paneling.MongolsGenghis Khan (died 1227), the renowned Mongol conqueror, sacked and destroyed Bukhara in 1224, sparing only the 12th-century Kalyan tower, which was used for throwing criminals to their death. The 14th-century Turkic conqueror Timur, however, endowed Samarkand with new glory by building a series of religious monuments widely renowned for their splendour and decorative use of glazed tiles. In the 16th century Bābur, prince of Fergana, coveted Samarkand. Failing to capture it, he chose Kābul as his headquarters for his conquest of India. His tomb there (he died in 1540) is the only visible testimony to the years he spent in the city.Emirate of BukharaAlthough fine-quality pottery decorated with animal, bird, and figural designs was being made in New Nisa in the 15th century, the artistic revival of the Mongol period that Timur had launched in western Turkistan had died out by the 16th century, when the emirate of Bukhara, incorporating much of Sogdiana, was established. Except for gold-thread embroidery and carpet making, in most of Central Asia the visual arts largely stagnated. In Mongolia the conversion of the Buryats to Lamaism in the 18th century brought into their tradition of ornamentation such Tibetan motifs as the lotus, dragon, and lion.In 1882 the emirate of Bukhara was incorporated as a Russian state. This political act had little cultural effect, and European art remained unknown to Central Asians. Traditional indigenous architecture of baked or unbaked brick construction was revived in the 18th century. Carved doors and screens were again produced. Old styles of Islāmic script were combined with arabesques to adorn metalwork. Zoomorphic junctures persisted in the animal designs created by metalworkers and potters alike, although the ornaments (jewelry) worn by nomadic women had become so stylized as to have lost all resemblance to the ancient animal motifs from which they were descended. Openwork remained a feature of much of the jewelry, notably of 