Tamerlane's Jewish Captives and the Samarkant Megillah

In 1393, after sacking the ancient Jewish community of Hamadan, Tamerlane's army swept a particular group of captives back to Samarkand: Jewish scribes, weavers, and physicians who carried with them not only their skills but their sacred scrolls. This episode follows the story of one such scribe, Isaac ben Benjamin, who was set to work in the Timurid kitabkhana copying Persian histories — but who also secretly copied a Megillat Esther on vellum smuggled from Baghdad. We explore what life was like for Jewish artisans under Timur, the web of religious tolerance and coercion in his capital, and the remarkable physical evidence that survives today: a fragment of that Megillah, written in a hand that also penned lines of the Zafarnama. Along the way, we touch on the Jewish communities of Herat, the Karaite scholar Aaron ben Elijah, and the forgotten cemetery of Bukhara. A story of faith, survival, and the strange ways a conqueror's library became a sanctuary for a forbidden scripture. #Tamerlane #Timur #Samarkand #MegillatEsther #JewishHistory #CentralAsia #Hamadan #Bukhara #Karaite #IsaacBenBenjamin #Zafarnama #Kitabkhana #14thCentury #PersianJews #History #FexingoHistory #CaptiveArtisans #ReligiousTolerance Keep every episode free: buymeacoffee.com/fexingo