Paper short abstract:

A. M.B. Meakin is one of the first European women visiting Turkestan at the beginning of the XX century. Though several women travelers such as Ujfalvy, M.I. Phibbs etc., visited before her, none of them provide deeply analyzed information about Central Asian Muslim women's life as she did.

Paper long abstract:

The history of women's life in Turkestan until the beginning of the XX century is one of the understudied topics. There are many reasons such as the deficiency of sources and poor activity of women in political and economic life.

The only sources that provide information about Turkestani women are few waqf documents, jung works and some qadi books. These sources mainly disclose the issues connected with women's donation, heir and divorce. Occasionally, the works of poetesses could be sources. Opening the routes to Central Asia by European travelers created a favourable condition for European female scholars and enthusiasts' penetration into Turkestan. This resulted the appearance of historical information about Turkestani women in travelogues and other books.

Between XVI and early XX centuries, there were no direct participation of women in political and economic policy of the country despite their status. Even female representatives of royal families were aside any state policy. This is also one of the factors why there is very little information about Turkestani women in historical sources.

Being a woman, A. Meakin had an opportunity to be close enough to women's life. One can find hardly any information about women scattered in various sources. For instance, Ujfalvy provides basic description, Mac Gahan gives some information about women's life in Khivan harem, M. Rickmers gives about their housing and etc. Unlike abovementioned authors, A. Meakin gives detailed information about Turkestani women such as their housework, make-up, dressing, appearance and types, women baths, and samples of stories about women. Describing girls' education, she eliminates the view that all Turkestani women were illiterate and they were not allowed to go to schools.

In conclusion, A. Meakin opened a new historical page in studying the life on Turkestani women. Her studies explore whether or not the women were isolated from any political processes.