Monuments of Merv

Archaeological research and ancient records have been combined in this work to provide a comprehensive account of the buildings of Merv, an oasis city in the middle of the Turkmenistani desert. Founded in the 6th century BC, Merv was a key staging post along the Central Asian trade routes linking Europe and India, and the splendour of its palaces, pavilions, gardens and towers impressed all who visited the city.
In this book, the author undertakes a detailed examination of the surviving buildings of Merv, from palaces and libraries to watch-towers and dovecotes.

Time and the weather have since eroded the mud brick from which these buildings were constructed, but enough remains for the imaginative reconstruction of an important group of early Islamic buildings. As a group, these buildings tell the story of the evolution of architectural styles in the early medieval and Seljuk eras (from the 7th to the 13th centuries AD), a period during which the Islamic world developed its own unique range of building types and decorative motifs.

The author also describes and illustrates the great range of treatments used for doors, windows, corridors and stairways, monumental entrances, rooms, domes and vaults, niches, wall decoration and flooring.
Dr Georgina Herrmann FSA set up the International Merv Project in 1991, and working with co-director Dr Kakamurad Kurbansakhatov, headed a team of specialists recording and excavation the remains of Merv.

Dr Herrmann has been fascinated with the monuments of Central Asia since the late 1950s when she was working for the UK Foreign Office in Iran. Having undertaken research at the British Institute of Persian Studies and at Oxford University, Dr Herrmann is now based at the Institute of Archaeology, University College London.

• Reports of the Research Committee of the Society of Antiquaries of London, No. 62
• ISBN 0 85431 275 7
• 297mm x 240mm portrait 260pp 316 illustrations (black and white and colour photographs, maps and line drawings)
• £90 hardback Published November 1999
• Available from Oxbow Books