Conflicting Stories about the Fragrant Concubine

We used Saturday before the great Sunday market to visit the Mausoleum of Abakh Hoja. Other than the Mausoleum the complex comprises a medrese (Islamic school), a mosque and an elegant gate with a beautiful porch next to it. All set in a park with ponds and roses and other flowers. The rectangular gate is decorated with blue tiles and white floral motives, its corners marked by two cylindrical spires. The porch to its left is supported by high wooden pillars, beautifully carved and painted in many colors that were light up by the morning sun. The Mausoleum has a quadratic baseline with slender round towers at the corner, inspired by Indian Mogul architecture. In its center a cupola rises. The walls are structured into large surfaces by arches and pilastres, the structure being emphasized by its colorful tiling in green, blue, redish-brown and a some yellow. The entrance gate is prominently emphasized by a large rectangular panel exceeding the facade in height from which a series of arches recedes towards the door. Inside one finds a great number of coffins covered by red, green, yellow, black and white cloth. Other than that there is no decoration, only the white walls and the high dome of the cupola above.

In Chinese the tomb is called ``Xiang Fei Mu'', Tomb of the Fragrant Concubine. She was the granddaughter of the famous Abakh Hoja, and, according to one version of the story, was abducted to be the concubine of the powerful Chinese emperor Qian Long, but resisted him until she was driven to suicide. The Chinese version of the story is that she was in accord with Qian Long's policies in Xin Jiang, lived peacefully to the age of 55, and is buried in the Qing tombs near Beijing. These facts have lead to a sharp drop in reverence paid to her.

We wandered about the peaceful garden, avoided as good as we could running into our fellow tourists, who come here from all over the world, successfully fended off the children vendors, who tried to sell small metal butterflies and flowers for 1 yuan a piece, and enjoyed the real flowers instead.