Samarkand, located in present-day Uzbekistan, is perhaps the
oldest extant city in Central Asia. Its location between two
of Central Asia’s major rivers and near the fertile Fergana
Valley has always made it like an oasis in the very dry and
rugged land, a natural trade center on the routes between
China and Iran. Its active commerce meant that it was desired
by many powers, and over the centuries the region fell under
the domination of Mongols from the northeast, Turks from the
west, and Persians and Arabs from the southwest. In the 14th
century Timur (his name means “iron,” but he is known in the
West as Tamerlane, from Timur Lenk, “Timur the Lame”) made
Samarkand the capital of his vast empire, which embraced what
are today the newly independent nations in Central Asia. While
Timur’s successors had to struggle during the 15th century
to keep his empire from collapse, they did continue his legacy
of extraordinary cultural achievement. Even after the fall
of the Timurid Empire, this culture that fused Turkic and
Persian traditions made an indelible impact on neighboring
India, Iran, and the Ottoman Empire.
From the 4th century b.c.e., peoples, goods, and ideas passed
through Samarkand along the Silk Road. Traders, diplomats,
soldiers, and missionaries carried home reports of the city.
In the 9th century a Chinese traveler wrote of Samarkand:
“The people are addicted to wine and like to sing and dance
in the streets.... The women have coiled chignons which they
cover with a black kerchief sewed with gold foil. When one
bears a child, she feeds it with stone honey, and places glue
in its palm, desiring that it speak sweetly when grown up.”
In the course of time, objects of trade, artistic styles,
and ideas that passed through Samarkand took on new forms,
meanings, and uses. Their origins are therefore sometimes
difficult to trace, but, for instance, Central Asian bowed
instruments eventually evolved into the European violin. The
fat-tailed dumba (a sheep-like animal with a huge tail) of
the Kyrghyz steppe, which the Chinese knew as almost a mythic
animal, spread to Iran, where it was the source of astrakhan
fur. The extraordinary carpets carried by the nomads and used
in their tents traveled eastward from Samarkand to China,
south to India, west to Turkey, and on to the West.
Central Asia has once again become a crossroads. Situated
between Asia and the West, the newly independent nations of
Central Asia are important players in the global economic,
cultural, and political dialogue. Oil as well as interest
in the cultural roots of many Asian and European traditions
have brought new generations of travelers and merchants to
this region. |
