Shir-Kabir Mausoleum

Most travelers in western Turkmenistan come for the Yangykala canyons or the Caspian shore. A few continue south-west to the ruined city of Dehistan, and fewer still drive the last few kilometers to Mashad, a medieval cemetery about six kilometers north-east of the city walls. That is where the Shir-Kabir Mausoleum stands, on a low mound beside a line of later tombs.

From the outside the building is modest: thick walls of square mud brick and a dome that has been restored more than once. Nobody knows who built it or exactly when. Comparisons with similar buildings place it between the 9th and 11th centuries, and it is often described as the oldest surviving mosque in Turkmenistan.

Inside, the building changes character. Carved ganch (stucco) from the 10th century survives on the walls - swirling foliage, Kufic inscriptions and faint traces of color. The mihrab has three nested niches, a sign that the building served both as a mosque and as a tomb. Local tradition links the burial to Ali ibn Sukkari, remembered as Shir-Kabir, and pilgrims still come to the site.

Shir-Kabir belongs to the story of Dehistan itself. The city, also known as Misrian, flourished on the caravan routes between the Caspian coast and Khorasan from the 10th to the 14th centuries and was abandoned by the 15th. In 1998 Dehistan/Misrian was added to UNESCO's Tentative List. Seen together on one day, the minarets of the city and the quiet mosque in its cemetery show how the place lived, prayed and buried its dead.

There are no crowds here and no ticket queues - only the plain, the wind and a building that has outlasted the city around it.