Cultural life in the Bukhara Khanate

Among the Shaybanid rulers there were educated people who wrote poetry, but they could not fully inherit the high level of science of the Timurid era. Medicine, mathematics and astronomy developed to some degree; under the Ashtarkhanids growing religious intolerance hurt learning, yet scholars such as Muhammad Sharif Bukhari worked, and Subhanquli Khan had a hospital, the “Dar ush-shifa”, built in Bukhara. Among historical works were the “Shaybaninama” of Kamaluddin Binai and of Muhammad Salih, Hafiz Tanish’s “Abdullanama” and Muhammad Haydar’s “Tarikh-i Rashidi”. In literature Shaybani Khan and Ubaydullah Khan wrote poems, and in the 17th–18th centuries Sayido Nasafi (“Hayvonotnama”) and Turdi Faraghi worked, while the works of Bedil, who lived in India, were widely read in the khanate; Turdi criticised heavy taxes and internal wars. Madrasas built in this period include the Mir-i Arab, Abdullah Khan and Nodir Devonbegi in Bukhara and the Kukeldash and Barakkhan in Tashkent; at Samarkand’s Registan the Sherdor and Tillakori were built in the 17th century by Yalangtush Bahadur. Education had two stages: in neighbourhood schools (maktabkhanas) children learnt reading, writing and counting, with separate schools for girls; then in the madrasa, fiqh, Arabic and other subjects were taught, but natural and technical sciences were not.