This book has presented an in-depth analysis of the story of Aghā-yi Buzurg and her path to becoming the “Great Lady” in sixteenth-century Bukhara. Through this case study, it has provided a unique insight into the complex intersection of gender and age within early modern Muslim discourse. In view of the scarcity of historical sources documenting female religious authority in Muslim contexts, we are fortunate to have access to the Maẓhar al-ʿajāʾib and later narrative traditions to reconstruct Aghā-yi Buzurg’s legacy and to trace people’s interest in her over half a millennium. The Maẓhar al-ʿajāʾib is a remarkable text that offers a basis for a reassessment of the role played by women in early modern Central Asia. Although the distinct view of history conveyed in devotional and hagiographical sources is often overlooked, such sources are essential for understanding the early modern religious worldview. The Maẓhar al-ʿajāʾib not only gives voice to Aghā-yi Buzurg, albeit through her male devotees and hagiographers, but also grants us a glimpse into popular attitudes and assumptions concerning women, women’s experiences, and societal gender ideals. Using sources such as the Maẓhar al-ʿajāʾib as a forum for historical reflection on societal perceptions of prescriptive gender roles creates new ways of conceptualizing gender history. By highlighting the complexity and shifting historical character of female religious authority, Aghā-yi Buzurg’s example demonstrates that the silence of the archives does not necessarily mean that women were excluded from public engagement and leadership opportunities in early modern Central Asia. The reproduction and reception of the Maẓhar al-ʿajāʾib over a period of several centuries could indicate that more texts dedicated to women were produced in Islamic Central Asia. Although it may sound fanciful, the possible existence of as yet undiscovered writings on women and their experiences is a promising prospect.

Chapter 4 explores the Chaghatay Book of Guidance, written in sixteenth-century Central Asia as a manual for women about ideal womanhood. The Book of Guidance was commissioned by the royal consort of the Shibanid ruler ʿUbaydullāh Khan, Moghūl Khanim, who is portrayed as a powerful patroness and disciple of Aghā-yi Buzurg in the Maẓhar al-ʿajāʾib. The fact that both the Book of Guidance and the Maẓhar al-ʿajāʾib were composed within the same historico-geographical and socioreligious environment makes them invaluable for the study of gender construction from a comparative perspective. The Book of Guidance constitutes key background reading on the prescribed gender roles of women in early modern Central Asia. It thus offers a historical contextualization for the Maẓhar al-ʿajāʾib from a gender perspective and allows us to better understand the complexities of Aghā-yi Buzurg’s case.

The public proclamation of pro-ʿAlid sentiment, encouraged under the Timurids, became dangerous when veneration of ʿAlī and his descendants began to be associated with sympathies for the Shiʿi Safavids. Although the Safavid state rapidly became a major political threat to its neighbors, the gradual conversion of the majority of Iran’s Sunni population to Shiʿism under Safavid rule caused even greater distress in Sunni Central Asia from a religious standpoint. Within the tumultuous religio-political environment of the early sixteenth century, we find Aghā-yi Buzurg and her disciples in Mawarannahr, where they continued the Timurid-era tradition of ʿAlid devotion under Shibanid rule. It is within this socioreligious context that Aghā-yi Buzurg’s veneration of the ahl al-bayt and the centrality of ʿAlidism in the Maẓhar al-ʿajāʾib are examined in Chapter 2.

Chapter 7 explores the shrine complex of Aghā-yi Buzurg and its history. Her shrine, known as that of “Qiz Bibi,” is situated near the city of Bukhara. The traditions surrounding the shrine remind visitors of Aghā-yi Buzurg’s superiority in her struggle with her famous enemy, Mīr-i ʿArab. The accounts explored in this final chapter allow us to discern the reinterpretation of the figure of Aghā-yi Buzurg over time, evident in the written narratives and oral materials in which she was turned into a 14-year-old virgin, Qiz Bibi. These sources demonstrate people’s efforts to make sense of Aghā-yi Buzurg’s legacy over a long period of time and shed light on the development of oral history in general.

Chapter 6 examines the narrative traditions surrounding Aghā-yi Buzurg’s character by exploring later hagiographical accounts about her. This chapter reconstructs the lore and public memory of Aghā-yi Buzurg and shows the continuity of people’s interest and moral investment in her legacy over the centuries since her passing. It closely examines the eighteenth-century Naqshbandī hagiographical compendium Tadhkira-yi Ṭāhir Īshān, which played an important role in the revitalization of Aghā-yi Buzurg’s remembrance in the second half of the eighteenth century in the regions of Khwarazm and Bukhara. This chapter showcases the vitality of Aghā-yi Buzurg’s commemoration in Central Asia in which her perceived sanctity retained its attraction over the course of almost half a millennium.

Chapter 3 contextualizes Aghā-yi Buzurg and her community within the Sufi milieu of sixteenth-century Central Asia by highlighting a particular aspect of this community, ṭarīqa-yi nā-maslūk (the untraveled path), one of the most frequently used designations to refer to the community in the Maẓhar al-ʿajāʾib. This chapter emphasizes the complex nature of “the untraveled path” by exploring the association of Aghā-yi Buzurg and her followers with the Khwājagān–Naqshbandī Sufi tradition. Aghā-yi Buzurg’s community was unique among Sufi groups: first, because it was guided by a woman, and second, because this woman had not been trained by a living master but instead had received her spiritual training from the enigmatic saintly figure of Khiżr, believed to be endowed with immortal life.

Chapter 1 examines the Timurid-era tradition of ʿAlid devotion and its continuation under the early Shibanid dynasty. Tīmūr’s tombstone inscriptions leave no doubt regarding the ʿAlid orientation of the Timurids. The imagery of ʿAlī that links the Chingizid and Timurid genealogical trees in the tombstone suggests the preeminence of ʿAlī’s authority over the legacy of Chingiz Khan in the Timurid legitimation narrative. However, the decline of the Timurid dynasty in the early sixteenth century brought about large-scale religious and political turmoil in the Persianate world. The contest between the newly founded Shibanid and Safavid dynasties facilitated the Shibanids’ development of a self-conscious Sunni orientation in response to the militant Shiʿism promoted by the Safavids, thus furthering Sunni–Shiʿi antagonism.

The Maẓhar al-ʿajāʾib reveals a remarkable world of female religiosity that went beyond mere “spirituality” and shows that Aghā-yi Buzurg exerted communal leadership, competed for spiritual superiority, negotiated with the Shibanid royal court, handled the community’s finances, and dealt with her enemies. In addition to her direct interaction with the Shibanid court and the Bukharan and Khurasani public and religious authorities, Aghā-yi Buzurg’s wide network of male and female allies active in various regions of Mawarannahr tells us that her community operated not on the margins of society but rather in the middle of major, ongoing social and religious events in early sixteenth-century Central Asia.

This book invites readers into the little-known world of female religious authority and gender history in early modern Islamic Central Asia. It tells the story of the sixteenth-century female Sufi master celebrated as Aghā-yi Buzurg (the Great Lady) and her community. This book germinated in my fascination with the life of Aghā-yi Buzurg, who continues to be honored and remembered today in oral traditions associated with her shrine complex in Bukhara, Uzbekistan. Those who visit the shrine are often reminded of the saint’s triumph over her contemporary rival, Mīr-i ʿArab, a prominent public figure whose grandiose madrasa remains active in Bukhara and constitutes a top tourist destination in the region.1