Lurje P. B.

Key words: Panjakent, Hisorak, upper part of Zeravshan valley, early mediaeval period, architecture, heating, hearth, altar, fire-temples, Zoroastrianism.

The so-called chapels are relatively small rooms with decorated fire-niche attached to one wall, sufas (podiums) along three other walls and entrance furnished with tambour wall. Such rooms are often found in residence buildings of early mediaeval period in Panjakent and to the east of it in the mountainous part of Zeravshan valley. There has been a long discussion on their function in scholarly literature. Some specialists think that “chapels” were home sanctuaries related to Zoroastrian fire cult, the others tend towards more secular meaning of living rooms.

The article gives description of the “chapels” excavated in the last twenty years in Panjakent and four ones in Hisorak in Matcha. Further, argumentation is given in favour of their function as sleeping rooms in winter. Apart from obvious difference of these rooms from Zoroastrian fire-temples, and their structural relation to today’s winter rooms of highland Tajiks, important indications are dense locations of such rooms within one household, especially in the mountains, and their low roofing, below 1.5 m from the floor. Moreover, these rooms are much more common in the cold mountain land to the east of Panjakent than in Panjakent itself. It is proposed that such rooms in Panjakent were features of families originated from the mountains.