Samarkand

Second Bukharan center - the "Jerusalem of the Silk Road" quarter (Iskhokhona) and the unique Gumbaz synagogue tradition.

Modern locality anchor

Samarkand

Uzbekistan · City · 39.7°N 67.0°E

This anchor orients the sourced locality record. It is not a reconstructed historical position or border; the single map below provides geographic context.

View location

Where is Samarkand?

Land geometry: Natural Earth 1:50m via world-atlas. Pins mark modern localities or representative regional anchors stored on Atlas place records, not historical borders and not reconstructed positions. · Sources & methods

THE COMMUNITY TIMELINE · EVERY NODE DATED

What happened to the Jewish community of Samarkand?

1400–1920

Historic community

1920–1991

Soviet era

1991–present

Post-1991 emigration

Today

Hundreds remain; Silk Road Jewish memory.

LANGUAGES & COMMUNITY

What did Samarkand sound like?

Judeo-PersianHebrew (עברית, Ivrit)

Judeo-Persian is a language with its own grammar, literature, and history — not “broken” anything, and not a dialect of Hebrew.

AFTER · IN FULL COLOR

What survives today?

In Samarkand

Hundreds remain; Silk Road Jewish memory.

Gumbaz Synagogue
synagogue · historic site
Distinctive domed structure.
Jewish quarter (Iskhokhona)
historic quarter · public landmark

SOURCES & REVIEW

YIVO Encyclopedia of Jews in Eastern Europe
YIVO Institute for Jewish Research / Yale University Press · 2010 · open source
Encyclopaedia Judaica, 2nd ed. (place entry)
Macmillan Reference USA · 2007

Reviewed 2026-07-30

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