Having given full enough particulars of the different matters of this city, I do not think I ought to omit to mention a beautiful palace which the great Sultan Assambei had built; and though there are many large and beautiful palaces in the city built by the kings, his predecessors, yet this, without comparison, far excels them all; so great was the magnificence of Assambei that, up to the present time, he has never had an equal in Persia. The palace is built in the centre of a large and beautiful garden, close to the city, with only a stream dividing them to the north, and in the same circumference a fine mosque is built with a rich and useful hospital attached. The palace in the Persian language is called Astibisti,[614] which, in our tongue, signifies “eight parts”, as it has eight divisions. It is thirty paces high, and is about seventy or eighty yards round, divided into eight parts, which are subdivided into four rooms and four anterooms, each room having the anteroom towards the entrance, and the rest of the palace is a fine circular dome. This palace is under one roof, or, as one should say, with one storey, and has only one flight of steps to ascend to the dome, the rooms and anterooms, since the staircase leads to the dome, and from the dome one enters the rooms and anterooms. This building, on the ground floor, has four entrances, with many more apartments, all enamelled and gilt in various ways, and so beautiful that I can hardly find words to express it. This palace, as I have already said, is situated in the centre of the garden, and is built on a terrace, or rather the mastabé has been raised round for appearance, being a yard and a half high and five yards wide, like a piazza. By every door of the palace there is a way paved with marble leading to the mastabé. By the door of the chief palace there is a small flight of steps of the finest marble by which one mounts to the mastabé, which is all made of fine marble, while in the centre of the mastabé there is a channel of a streamlet paved and skilfully worked out in marble. This streamlet is four fingers broad and four deep, and flows all round in the form of a vine or a snake. It rises at one part, flows round, and at the same place again the water is conducted away elsewhere. For three yards above the mastabé is all of fine marble. All below is plastered in different colours, and is conspicuous far off like a mirror.

The terrace of the palace has for each angle a gutter or spout, which spurts out water, and the spout is immensely large, and made in the form of a dragon; they are of bronze, and so large that they would do for a cannon, and so well made as to be taken for live dragons. Within the palace, on the ceiling of the great hall, are represented in gold, silver, and ultramarine blue, all the battles which took place in Persia a long time since; and some embassies are to be seen which came from the Ottoman to Tauris presenting themselves before Assambei, with their demands and the answer he gave them written in the Persian character. There are also represented his hunting expeditions, on which he was accompanied by many lords, all on horseback, with dogs and falcons. There are also seen many animals like elephants and rhinoceroses, all signifying adventures which had happened to him. The ceiling of the great hall is all decorated with beautiful gilding and ultramarine. The figures are so well drawn that they appear like real living human beings.

On the floor of the hall is spread a magnificent carpet, apparently of silk, worked in the Persian manner with beautiful patterns, which is round, and of the exact measurement the place requires; likewise in the other rooms the floor is all covered. This hall has no light except what it gets from the anterooms and chambers. Still there are entrances from the centre hall to the apartments and anterooms where there are many windows all giving light, each anteroom having only one window, but that one as large as the whole side of a room, and beautifully fitted. Thus when these doors are open, the palace, or rather the hall, is so brilliant with these beautiful figures, that it is a wonder to see. This is the palace where Assambei used to give audience. About a bowshot from the palace there is a harem of one storey, so large that a thousand women might conveniently live there in different rooms. Among the rooms is a large one like a hall, with the walls all adorned with gold and plaster, looking like emerald and many other colours. The ceiling of this harem is ornamented with gold and ultramarine. From this hall there are many chambers on every side, with all the doors superbly decorated with gold and blue, and many signs and letters made of mother of pearl, in beautiful patterns; and through the centre of this hall flows a stream of pure water, a cubit in breadth and as much deep. On one side of this harem is a summer-house four yards square, beautifully decorated with enamel, gold, and ultramarine blue, in patterns really a wonder to see. Here the queen stays with her maidens to do needlework, according to their custom.

And in truth it would be too long and too tedious for me to recount everything about the palace and the harem, which is in the same garden, and has three entrances, one to the south, another to the north, and the third to the east. That to the south is arched with bricks, but not very large, and leads to the garden, the palace being a bowshot distant; passing through the gate, fifteen paces off on the left is a gallery, a bowshot in length and six paces broad, which from one end to the other has seats of the finest marble, with a kind of railing with a design, as an ornament in relief of plaster, of various colours, quite a wonder to behold from the excellence of the workmanship. The roof is all ornamented with gold and plaster. This gallery is supported from one end to the other by columns of fine marble; in front of it there is a fountain, as long as the gallery, of fine marble likewise, which is always full of water, and is twenty-five paces broad. In it there are always four or five couple of swans; round it there are rose trees and jessamines, and a smooth road leading direct to the royal palace.

On the north side, one must enter a certain place like a cloister, paved with bricks, with seats of marble round it. This place is so large that it will hold three hundred horses, as the lords who came to the court used to dismount here when Assambei was reigning. In this place there is a door entering the garden on the way to the king’s palace, which is an arch fifteen yards high and four yards wide, beautifully worked in plaster from top to bottom. The door is made of marble, in one square carved piece about four yards each way; its height about a yard and a half; its breadth about the same. The rest of the marble is cut into designs, and when it is exposed to the rays of the sun it shines so brilliantly on both sides, that it appears like crystal, since the marbles found in Persia do not resemble ours, but are much finer; they are not opaque, but are more a species of crystal. Beyond this lordly door there is a fine paved road leading to the royal palace.

The other door, towards the east, is on an immense maidan or piazza, and leads into the garden. This door has a wall of bricks, in the form of an arch, three yards high and two broad, without any decorations, but simply whitened with plaster, and through it there is a fine large fountain. Over this there is a large edifice with many rooms, and a covered hall looking over the garden. On the side towards the maidan there is an arched gallery, so white as to exceed in whiteness anything I think I have ever seen. Into this building Assambei used to retire with many lords whenever a feast was made on this maidan, and frequently when ambassadors came they used to put them up here, as it was a fine place and had many apartments. This door is further than the others from the royal palace, with a splendid view of the maidan, on which are the mosque and the hospital I have already mentioned. This mosque was built by Sultan Assambei, is very large, and has within many rooms all decorated with plaster, gold, and blue.

Also the hospital or moristan, is large, having many buildings, and within it is even more beautifully ornamented than the mosque, having many large wards about ten yards long and four broad, each of these being fitted with a carpet to its measurement. Between the hospital and the mosque there is a wall only, and outside the hospital, from one side to the other, is a mastebe one cubit high and two yards broad, and there used to be an iron chain drawn from one side to the other round the border of the mastebe; so that no horse might approach either the mosque, hospital, or mastebe. At the time that Assambei and Jacob Sultan reigned, more than a thousand poor people lived in the hospital, and the chain was kept until the death of Jacob Sultan, and was then taken away by the Turkomans. All these edifices were raised by the great Assambei, who was so excellent and worthy a man that there has never been his equal in Persia, as he conquered by force of arms many Persian lords who rebelled against him. And in the contest with the Ottoman Sultan he gained glory by defeating and routing his army, though another time he came off worst, as you will learn from what I am now about to relate to you.