I’m sure like many others, I watched the events in Russia over the weekend. I had a 20+ year start on most peoples as I’ve despised Putin since almost the day he came to power due to his brutal obliteration of Chechnya.
I remember back then being a bit disappointed not just on that but the fact I knew most of my adult life would be overshadowed by this vulgar toad headed dictator. He shares a lot of attributes of dictators through the ages and bizarrely with a manager in a company I used to work at.
He was in charge of accounts and the company was going downhill. This chap obviously thought highly of himself and would talk a very tough game on the phone as bottom of the barrel staff such as myself would look on in disbelief and exchange sniggers at what he was saying for the people at the very bottom all knew a fraud when we saw one and he was it. He had all the backbone of jelly or so we thought.
One day after a series of heated telephone calls, someone arrived at the front door of the organisation, demanding money that was rightfully his and demanded the Accounts man show his face. He refused to even answer his phone and blustered furiously at the receptionist who saw the man hanging around outside.
A few minutes later the fellow strode in and refused to move. For all his months of belligerence and tough talking, the Accounts manager nervously went downstairs and came back 15 minutes later looking rather shaken. He had agreed to pay everything owed.
“Jelly!” my colleague Andrew and I laughed.
And so it seemed that way with Putin on Saturday when his personal jet departed Moscow and switched off its tracker as his foe neared the city gates.
It all reminded me of the famous curse of Tamerlane or Timur the Lame; one of the most violent and destructive rulers in history. A man with no real redeeming features (hello again Boris Johnson) and a fearsome warlord from Central Asia. After a life time of wreaking havoc he died aged 68 in 1405 and was buried in the legendary city of Samarqand.
It is said that Timur killed 17 million people which is quite a feat for anyone, let alone in the time before modern weaponry. 17 million people in those days was equal to 5% of the entire population of the planet.
Centuries later and another tyrant was on the prowl, Stalin. He had a great interest in Timur and wanted to bring his body to Moscow. There was just one problem, there was a well known curse!
An expedition led by Tashmuhammed Kari-Niyazov and Mikhail Gerasimov began excavations in the Gur-E-Amir, Samarqand in June 1941.
It’s unclear why they got the idea to study the graves. There are versions that the digging was initiated to save the remains – at the time, the construction of a hotel began next to the mausoleum and, in the course of construction work, water began to seep into the tomb.
Officially, the opening of the tomb was timed for the 500-year anniversary of Uzbek poet Alisher Navoi, who lived in the Timurid Empire and was close with the grandchildren and the descendants of Timur. The scientists hoped to uncover new historical details or find artifacts that could be shown to the public.
The curse was known for centuries before Stalin and is quoted as stating
“Who disturbs Tamerlan’s tomb will release a spirit of war. And such a bloody and terrible slaughter will commence that the world has not seen in all eternity.”
Another well known one is “When I rise from the dead, the world shall tremble.”
These give an idea of what just a nice and peace-loving man Timur was and might have given many reasonable people a reason to pause and wonder if disturbing the Timur was the right thing to do.
It is even said perhaps with less legitimacy that even in the tomb it was written “Whomsoever opens my tomb shall unleash an invader more terrible than I.”
Local residents and Muslim clergy tried to stop the excavations, but the expedition continued its work. The superstitious locals might have thought something dreadful was going to happen but not scientifically minded archaeologists from Moscow.
These excavations were aimed to examine the human remains in the tombs and to prove that they belonged to Tamerlane and his closest relatives. Excavations began on 16th June They first opened the tombs of Ulugbek’s sons, then the tomb of Timur’s sons: Miranshah and Shahrukh. On 18th June they discovered the remains of Ulugbek, the grandson of Timur. On the 19th June the heavy gravestone was taken from the Tamerlane’s tomb.
On the 20th June the tomb of Tamerlane was opened and the mausoleum was filled with sharp choking odour of the mixture of resins, camphor, rose and frankincense.
His remains were taken back to Moscow to be studied and then, possibly, the fearsome curse came true. Just two days after the tomb of Timur was opened, on the night of the 22nd June, Nazi Germany invaded the Soviet Union. If that doesn’t teach you the lesson to respect ancient curses then I’m not sure what will.
It seemed that Stalin himself had second thoughts and the body of Tamerlane was returned to Samarqand and reburied in fitting Islamic service worthy of an Emir. Strangely enough, soon afterwards the Nazi invasion faltered and Soviet forced prevailed at the Battle of Stalingrad.
The resting place of Timur, Gur-E-Amir, is still standing in Samarqand although it has been heavily restored, some would say slightly ruined and if you so wish then you can pay your respects to one of the most fearsome men in history…. just don’t remove the lid!
My blog has been going on for so long that the search functions are now unable to find old posts when I look for them so after on three occassions looking for an old post on Timur and not being able to find one (which I found hard to believe), I later found this Timur post from 2015 but it’s too late now as I have written this new post!
Stephen Liddell 