The first European to pass through Dekhistan was Arthur Connely, of Great Game fame, in 1836. By this time the city was already hundreds of years dead. Dekhistan, and the fertile surrounding Misrian oasis, had been a major stopping point on the route linking Khoresm to the north on the Oxus river with Girkiana, in present-day Iran. It was a rich city of mosques, medressas and caravanserais, towering minarets and monuments of fired brick that spread over 200 hectares, surrounded by cultivated fields and pastureland.
It had been inhabited since the third millennium B.C., though not continuously, and unlike many other cities it survived the Mongols, who destroyed many of its buildings, and continued to be a major stopping point for caravans on its branch of the Silk Road, and a major center of crafts such as pottery and glassblowing. Until the fifteenth century, when the city was mysteriously abandoned and swallowed by the desert. Dekhistan consists of two distinct parts: the ruins of the city of Misrian, which include ruins of a beautiful Timurid-style archway, as well as two minarets and the excavation of a caravanserai, and the Shir-Kabir mosque, eight kilometers away.
Like all monuments in Turkmenistan, this one sits in the center of acres of graves. The Turkmen believe that burying their dead near holy sites bestows a blessing upon the deceased. The fallen walls of other ancient mausoleums also surround the mosque, but this building rises on its hill, strangely complete, even to its simple brick dome.
The interior of the tomb is simple and unadorned, except for the mikhrab, a bay in the wall, half-hidden by scaffolding. The mikhrab’s purpose is to help the faithful direct their prayers toward Mecca. The only decoration in this dun-colored room, it bursts with ornate vegetal design and Arabic script in faded blue and chalky white. This mosque-tomb, probably converted from a Zoroastrian temple, is the oldest in Turkmenistan.
The secret of Dekhistan’s destruction is really very simple, and the key to it is in the fired brick scattered all over the site.
Most of the structures in the desert were built of mud bricks, unfired because in most places there were very few trees. But Dekhistan was special, the capital of the vast and fertile Misrian oasis, nestled up against the Kopet Dag to the East, whose forested slopes sheltered streams that fed agriculture here for a few thousand years.
The inhabitants of Dekhistan chopped the trees down to fire bricks and build the beautiful caravanserais and palaces, minarets and mosques of this silk-road city. The deforestation resulted in desertification. Without the trees to help retain moisture and actually create rain, the land dried up catastrophically, and the city was abandoned.
Having survived the squat, lice-covered and deadly Mongol armies, the proto-fascist, proto-genocidal Timur the Lame, and three major waves of civilization, the great kingdom was eventually destroyed by ambitious city planners, architects, and very likely overpopulation. Once the trees were gone, this may have taken less than a generation.
Dekhistan is accessible only by 4-wheel-drive in good weather. It lies over 150 kilometers south of Balkanabat. Roads are sub standard for most of the way. For the last part of the journey, roads are non-existent and the track is over desert hardpan.
A good travel company that can get you there is Ayan.
