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language, and it means ‘middle,’
17
for it is always in the middle of the people, with
the exception, however, that no one places himself right to the south, for in that
direction the doors of the court open. But to the right and left they may spread out
as they wish, according to the lay of the land, so long as they do not bring the line of
tents down right before or behind the court.”
Ethnographic and archaeological studies of nomadic cultures in Central Asia
show that for a considerable number of sites we have no signs of permanent
buildings. This could be evidence that part of the terrain of the former city was
occupied by yurts (nomadic tents), which apparently were arranged in quarters as
they continued to be in later (and even modern) cities
18
. A similar type of city-site
was discovered during the excavation of Novyj Sarai on the Volga
19
: a rich house
with a paved yard was unearthed, and traces of yurts were found in the area. Even in
the present time, one can find such combination of permanent dwellings, with
nomad tents in rural areas and in towns, most commonly in an urban environment
(for example at Ulan Bator)
20
. So this ancient tradition that has survived millennia
remains a characteristic feature of the cities and settlements of former nomadic
peoples.
The next site of nomadic type known to me was located in the Volga region
and was connected with nomadic ethnic Volga’s Bolgarians. The ruins of the capital
Bolgara are found near the village of Bulgarskoe (Bolgary in Tatarstan), a village
which on the maps of imperial Russia appears as the village Uspenskoe in the
district Spasskoe in the province of Kazan.
21
We owe a colorful description of the state of Volga’s Bulgaria geographical and
ethnographic character to Ibn-Fadlan, who visited this place in the year 922. He
writes about the local residents:
“all of them [live] in tents (yurts), with the only difference that the yurt of the
king is so much bigger that it can contain one thousand souls, and that the greater
part of it is covered by Armenian carpets. In the middle of it stands the throne [of
the Tsar] covered by Byzantine brocade (207b).”
22
17
Compare with ancient Turc ‘orta’ ‘middle’, ‘center’. See: Dictionary of Ancient Turc, Izd-vo
Sovetskaya Entsiklopediya, Leningrad 1969, 371.
18
L. L.Victorova, Mongoly. Proishozhdenie naroda i istoki kul'tury Nauka, Moskva 1980, 59.
19
G. A. Fyodorov-Davydov, I. S. Vainer, A. G. Muhamadiev, “Arheologicheskie issledovania Tsarevskogo
gorodischa (Novyj Saray) v 1959-1966 gg,” Povolzh'e v srednie veka, Nauka, Moscow 1970,.71.
20
Victorova, Mongoly,. 59. See also N. M. Schepetil'nikov, Arkhitectura Mongolii Iskusstvo, Moskva
1960; D. Maidar, Arkhitectura i gradostroitel'stvo Mongolii Ocherki po istorii Stroiizdat, Moscow 1971.
It is interesting to note that even today in the mountain villages of the Surkhandarya and Kashkadarya
regions, the stock-breeding population keeps yurts beside its modern houses.
21
The distance between the site of the ancient settlement and the left bank of the Volga is about 6.5
km. Such distance corresponds to the description of Ibn-Fadlan, who wrote that to reach the river it
was only necessary to go less than one farsakh. One can therefore conclude that neither the city nor the
riverbed have changed their original site. V. V. Bartol’d, “Bolgary,” Sоchineniya, 5, Izd-vo vostochnoi lit-
ry, Moscow 1968, 514.
22
I. J. Krachkovskiy (Trans.), Puteshestvie Ibn-Fadlana na Volgu, Izd-vo Mifi-Servis, Moscow 1939, 73.
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Istakhri also left (225) us an interesting account of two other cities, situated
not far from each other: Bolgar and Suvar.
23
He reports that in each of them was a
Friday mosque, and that the male population of both cities totaled about ten-
thousand. Most interesting for us is his observation that during the winter the
inhabitants lived in wooden houses, and in tents during the summer.
A still later source refers to a fragment quoted by Makdisi (361). According to
this source, Bolgar was situated on both sides of the river, where houses were
constructed of wood and reeds, while the inhabitants of Suvar lived in tents.
24
The archaeological researches conducted on these settlements have shown
that
Bolgar in the tenth or early in the eleventh century occupied a comparatively
small area, whereas Bilyar and Suvar (Fig. 5) territorially were large cities.
25
All of the examples cited above substantiate the origins of the nomadic city,
and we would argue that an archaeological site such as Kalai Zakhoki Maron can be
considered its prototype. Very likely it is the only archaeological site that, according
to the archaeological context, was built in the 2
nd
– 1
st
century BCE and thus was
directly contemporary with the migration of nomadic tribes, and which still
preserves the original plan in spite of more recent dwellings built on certain parts of
the city.
So we can presume that Kalai Zakhoki Maron embodies the typical nomadic
city-residence, with a citadel in the center, which in former times would have been
surrounded by streets and quarters of yurts (tents). The construction of fortification
walls on such enormous scale required colossal strength and means, which most
likely meant the local population was recruited for forced labor to erect the city
walls.
An another period which possesses archaeological evidences on the
transformation of nomad city-site into traditional city conduct us in medieval
central Asian region, specifically in Maverranakhr.
If one looks at the political history of Maverranakhr (the territory between
Amudarya and Syrdarya) during its inclusion in the Chagatay state, two tendencies
clearly emerge which teach us more about the nature of the semi-nomadic city.
These tendencies expressed the interests of a ruling clique of nomadic aristocracy:
23
V. V. Bartold cites Aufi (Jamil’al-hikaiyat, book IV, ch.18), according to whom “the distance between
Bolgar and Suvar took two days one way; from what source this statement is drawn is not known”, See
Bartol’d, “Bolgary,” 514.
24
The source specifies that the Friday mosque stood on the market square: see Bartol’d, ”Bolgary,” 514.
In his Divanu lugat at-turk, Mahmut Kachgary (eleventh century) writes that the language of “Bulgars,
Suvars, Pechenegs, located close to the borders of Rum, connects the Turkic with equally truncated ends of
words.” (Materialy po istorii Sredney i Tsentral’noy Azii 10-19 vv. Fan, Tashkent 1988, 22.)
25
A. P. Smirnov. “Voljskaya Bulgaria,” Archaeology of the USSR. Steppes of Eurasia during an Epoch of
the Middle Ages, (Ed.. S. A. Pletneva) Nauka, Moscow 1981, 208-212. For literature on archaeological
excavations, see : Smirnov, Voljskaya, 212.
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