| Court art of Sogdian Samarqand in the 7th century AD | |||||||||||||
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Western wall
| Right above the heads of figures 5 and 6 (western wall) there are clearly
visible nine poles. They are comparable to similar objects on another part of
the same wall. The Tang shu reports on Sogd: "Les principautés s'en sont détachées des rameaux s'appelent Ngan (Boukhârâ), Ts'ao (Kaboûdhan), Che (Taschkend), Mi (Maimurgh), Ho (Kouschânidja), Ho-siun (Khâarizm), Meou-ti, Che (Kesch). On les nomme communément les neuf familles." [Transl. Chavannes] Compare the close-up below: |
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Above: In our opinion these are eight poles for eight "families", and the ninth, most probably the central one, should be the remaining banner of Samarqand proper. Seemingly this is a first rank state device, and therefore we expect the image of the corresponding ruler (i.e., king Varxuman) to have been not far from here. [Cp. our discussion of the upper part of the wall]
Back to explanation of figures 5A, 5 and 6
Back to main text (western wall)
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