Paper short abstract:

The Silk Road is a system of routes. One of the sections of the Silk Road is the Ferghana-Syrdarya corridor. A river route also functioned along the Ferghana-Syrdarya corridor. The Syrdarya served as an important artery connecting the oases and the steppe. Coastal cities were large trading centers

Paper long abstract:

Набиджон Рахимов (Худжандский государственный университет; nabir@mail.ru)

Речной маршрут Фергано-Сырдарьинского коридора Шёлкового пути.

Статья посвящена истории формирования и функционирования речного торгового пути по Сырдарье и его роли в торговом и культурном обмене по Шёлковому пути.

Шёлковый путь – это система коммуникаций, связывавших Восток и Запад Евразии. Один из участков Шёлкового пути – Фергано-Сырдарьинский коридор. Эта дорога пролегала по долине Сырдарьи. Уникальность этого коридора в том, что здесь был речной маршрут, альтернативный сухопутному пути.

Средневековые географы указывают, что Сырдарья была судоходной рекой. Потенциал и течение реки Сырдарья использовались для транспортировки товаров и пассажиров между разными владениями. Сырдарья служила важной артерией, соединявшей оазисы и степи Средней Азии. Города на берегу реки стали крупными торговыми центрами. Расположенные вблизи реки города имели пристани для лодок и плотов, их население было вовлечено в торговую деятельность. В топографии Худжанда сохранились названия «Кемачи» (лодочник) и «бандар» (пристань). Купцы Худжанда отправляли вниз по реке большие плоты с сухофруктами, тканями и другими товарами. В устье реки товары перегружались на верблюды и отправлялись в Россию.

Сравнительный анализ результатов археологических раскопок, сведений письменных источников и данных архивных документов позволяют изучать вопросы водного пути по р.Сырдарья. Эти материалы доказывают, что р. Сырдарья сыграла для региона важную роль в качестве культурно-коммуникационной системы.

Nabijon Rahimov (Khujand State University; nabir@mail.ru)

River route of the Ferghana-Syrdarya corridor of the Silk Road

The paper focuses on the history of the formation and functioning of the river trade route along the Syrdarya and its role in trade and cultural exchange along the Silk Road.

The Silk Road is a system of communications that connected the East and West of Eurasia. One of the sections of the Silk Road is the Ferghana-Syrdarya corridor. The uniqueness of this corridor is that there was a river route, an alternative to the land route.

Medieval geographers point out that the Syrdarya was a navigable river flowing through Fergana, Khujand possession, Ustrushana, Ilak, Chach, and Isfijab. The potential and flow of the Syrdarya River were used to transport goods and passengers between different settlements. Data from archaeological and written sources testify to the flourishing of trade along the river route in antiquity and the Middle Ages. The Syrdarya served as an important artery connecting the oases and steppes of Central Asia. Cities on the banks of the river became major trading centers. The cities located near the river had piers for boats and rafts, their population was involved in trading activities. In the topography of Khujand, the names "Kemachi" (boatman) and "Bandar" (pier) have been preserved. Merchants of Khujand sent large rafts down the river with large quantities of dried fruits, fabrics and other goods. At the mouth of the river, goods were loaded onto camels and sent to Russia.

The Syrdarya has played an important role in the region as a cultural and communication system. The river route along the Syrdarya connected the extreme parts of the corridor from the riverine points of Fergana to Isfijab and served as a connecting link between the steppe and oasis routes of Silk Road.

Paper short abstract:

Western, primarily Russian travelers and officials left many records, memoirs, and reports, the essence of which is exoticism, orientalization, and otherness to what was accepted in their countries. My paper deals with bazaars of Russian Turkestan in 19th - early 20th centuries

Paper long abstract:

Bazaars of Russian Turkestan or where the West encounters the East

The East has always been a mystery to Westerners. This is especially evident when it comes to the oriental bazaar. Bizarre architecture, a variety of races, unusual goods for sale - all this existed in the imaginary world of Western peoples and adventurers, artists and merchants, and at the same time, these attributes were and are the most recognizable attributes of the bazaars of Russian Turkestan in the 19th - early 20th centuries.

Western, primarily Russian travelers and officials left many records, memoirs, and reports, the essence of which is exoticism, orientalization, and otherness to what was accepted in their countries.

In our study, we will try to identify the most recognizable clichés and stereotypes of "orientalism" of local bazaars, traders, practitioners, etc. Let us find out how much, starting from the 1870s, the imaginary East with its irrational value system forced the colonial administration to take inadequate measures and decisions to transform the region's trading activities. We will try, on the basis of archival documents and information from the works of Russian and Western authors, to analyze the consequences of attempts to reform traditional bazaars in the manner widely known as "civilizing mission" met hidden and sometimes open protests.

Using the example of adventurers of all kinds, who received the nickname "Gospoda Tashkentsy", we will try to draw a "portrait" of such seekers of fortune, for whom Turkestan was like Klondike during the gold rush. In the following decades, their example was followed by ordinary landless and deprived peasants from the central provinces of European Russia, who by hook or by crook moved to the indigenous regions of Turkestan.