History Repeats Itself
Merv — former capital of the world
Few people know anything about Turkmenistan, and far fewer have actually gone there. But its former capital of Merv was once the hub of the universe: a major stop on the Silk Road, a center for science and culture (home of Omar Khayyam), and in the ninth century, the capital of the Caliphate of the entire Muslim world. By the 13th century, Merv was reputed to be the largest city in the world, with a population of half a million.
I visited Merv several years ago. It was deserted and desolate — no tourists, no souvenir shops or restaurants, nothing. It reminded me a lot of Shelley’s poem Ozymandias, especially the last line:
Nothing beside remains. Round the decay
of that colossal Wreck, boundless and bare,
The lone and level sands stretch far away.
Also located in the country of Turkmenistan is its current capital city, Ashgabat. For years, the country’s post-Soviet dictator, one Saparmurat Niyazov, who labeled himself Turkmenbashi (= ‘leader of the Turkmen’), ruled as one of the most ruthless and self-agrandizing dictators in modern history, and built golden monuments to himself. He required all people to possess and to read his biography; there is even a large statue in Ashgabat of just that book. The modern city is really beautiful: a gleaming white marble city where the glory of Turkmenbashi is manifest everywhere.
Turkmenbashi
Yes, Turkmenbashi is a lot like the old Ozymandias, whose most famous quotation could equally well be that of Turkmenbashi:
My name is Turkmenbashi, King of Kings;
Look on my Works, ye Mighty, and despair!
Will the white marble city of Ashgabat eventually return to the ‘lone and level sands’, just as Merv did nearly 1000 years ago? Will the golden statues of Turkmenbashi lie in pieces in a lonely desert?
History repeats itself again and again, as egotistical tyrants continue to build huge monuments to themselves, only to be forgotten by history.