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If for personal experience you want to see a performance in the Uzbek language, then in the center of Samarkand on the Theater Square, not far from the Ruhabad Mausoleum there is the main theater of Samarkand. The theater building was built in Soviet times, and somewhat resembles the building of the Bolshoi Theatre in Moscow, but only without sculptures on the roof of the portal. In addition to performances in Uzbek, there are also performances in Russian and Tajik.
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Burial place of the Sufi teacher Burkhan ad-Din Sagardji, who died in the 1380s. It became engulfed by later buildings around Gur-e-Emir, which were cleared away in 1996 so the mausoleum complex was rediscovered and rebuilt.
A large green park with a minimum of amenities and benches, not far from the Gur-e Emir Mausoleum. You will definitely pass through this park if you continue walking towards Registan Square. The park has many coniferous and chestnut trees. There is a spring and a monument to the two Tiger Guards of Samarkand.
Amir Temur Mausoleum
The warlord Timur or Tamerlane (c 1320-1405) preferred to campaign in spring / summer and lay up during the cruel steppes winter. On his last sortie, already in his eighties, in a hurry to attack Ming China, he sickened and died at Farab (nowadays Otrar), to no great sorrow by the Chinese ambassadors he'd imprisoned. It was impossible to transport him through the snow to the tomb he'd prepared at Shahrisabz, so he was laid here, in the tomb intended for his grandson who'd died of battle wounds in Turkey in 1403. Both bodies were reburied in 1409, as it became the Timurid dynastic crypt. The mausoleum is richly tiled and decorated: the piece of jade over Timur's headstone, the largest in the world, is a poke in the eye of the Emperor of China, since it was purloined from his palace.
It houses a Museum of Religious and National Tolerance, as well as an art gallery. The building was constructed in 1882. During the Soviet era, the large bell tower and domes on the roof of the church were destroyed by communists and atheists. A small airplane was placed in place of the bell tower, and the building was used for various purposes, such as housing the paramilitary organization DOSAAF. After the collapse of the USSR, the church was no longer suitable for worship due to its destroyed bell tower, and was therefore turned into a museum. This is one of the 3-4 inactive former churches in Samarkand.
This magnificent square is the defining image, not only of Samarkand but of the whole Silk Road. It became the city's main square from the 15th century, Timurid times, after Afrosiab was abandoned. It's lined by three madrasahs, all with grand portals and richly adorned. Ulugbek on the west side is the oldest madrasah, from 1417; its upper floor has been lost. Shirdor facing it on the east side was built from 1619; "Shir" means tiger, from the motif on its portal. Tilya-Kori on the north side was built from 1646 and was also the grand mosque; the name means "gilded". Each madrasah is set around a courtyard, with student lodgings and classrooms.
It is one of the city's three active Orthodox churches, and the largest one (there are others which are inactive), subordinate to the Samarkand Deanery of the Tashkent and Uzbekistan Diocese (Central Asian Metropolitan District) of the Russian Orthodox Church of the Moscow Patriarchate. Named after Metropolitan Alexei of Moscow, who lived in the 14th century, the church was built in 1912 in the Russian Revival architecture style, originally for a military garrison. Orthodoxy is the main Christian denomination in Samarkand. Most of the local Russians, Belarusians, Ukrainians, Georgians, some of the local Koreans, and other small ethnic groups (for example, Greeks, Latvians, and Moldovans) that arrived during the Imperial and Soviet periods are Orthodox.