Istaravshan

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istaravshan
Истаравшан
Basic data
State : TajikistanTajikistan Tajikistan
Province : Sughd
Coordinates : 39 ° 54 '  N , 69 ° 0'  E Coordinates: 39 ° 54 '30 "  N , 69 ° 0' 18"  E
Height : 992  m
Area : 900  km²
Residents : 60,200 (2007)
Population density : 67 inhabitants / km²
Postal code : 735610
Structure and administration
Community type: city
Istaravshan (Tajikistan)
Istaravshan
Istaravshan

Istaravshan ( Tajik Истаравшан , Persian استروشن), English transcription Istaravshan , until 2000 Ura-Tjube ( Ura Tube, Ura-Tiube, Ura-Tyube , Russian Ура́-Тюбе , Tajik Уротеппа , Uroteppa, Ura-Teppa ), is the capital of the district of the same name ( nohija ) in the province ( vilojat ) Sughd in northern Tajikistan . According to the official estimate from 2007, 60,200 people live in the city and 199,000 in the district.

Presumably at the place of today's city was in the 6th century BC. BC settlement Kuruschata (Kurukada) belonging to the Achaemenid Empire , which is mentioned in Greek sources as Cyropolis (Kiropol). In ancient times and in the Middle Ages, the city, which was repeatedly destroyed by foreign conquerors, was a prosperous trading center on the Silk Road . From the 16th to 19th centuries, more mosques and mausoleums have been preserved in the extensive old town than in other Tajik cities. From the central former citadel hill Mugh Teppa the entire city center can be seen.

location

From Mugh Teppa Citadel Hill to the southwest

Istaravshan lies at an altitude of 992 meters on a plain north of the 4000 meter high Turkestan chain on the southwestern edge of the Ferghana Valley , which - geographically and culturally in the heart of Central Asia - follows the course of the Syrdarya to the east. The only road (M34) from the state capital Dushanbe leads past the first city north of the pass summit, Shahriston , crosses 27 kilometers after Istaravshan and reaches 78 kilometers northeast of the provincial capital Khujand . A side road branches off in a south-easterly direction to the villages of Tschorbogh and Basmanda at the foot of the Turkestan chain. The direct road to the Uzbek border, a few kilometers to the west, is interrupted and the continuation of the M34 from Istaravshan north to the Tajik village of Zafarobod leads a piece through Uzbek territory and then on to Tashkent . The next generally open border crossing to Uzbekistan is in Oybek, 60 kilometers northwest of Khujand.

From the beginning of the Christian era, Istaravshan was on a section of the Silk Road running through Sogdia , which led from Samarkand to Istaravshan and about 35 kilometers northeast of here to a fortified city with the current name of Shirin. The place is connected in the folk tale with the love story of Farhad and Shirin , it is four kilometers northwest of the village of Kurkat, south of the Uzbek city of Bekobod . According to Igor V. P'yankov, Shirin may have been mentioned in contemporary sources with the Persian name Kurushata and later with the Latin name Cyropolis. The fortress was the northernmost place in the early medieval region of Usrushana, which Istaravshan also belonged to. From there the Silk Road followed the Syr Darya eastwards via Khujand, Isfara and Osh to Kashgar .

The Fergana Valley, which without the irrigation canals that have existed since antiquity would be a desert-like dry landscape, is one of the most densely populated regions in Central Asia with an average of 360 inhabitants per square kilometer. The oasis of Istaravshan mainly receives water from the Kattasai reservoir located three kilometers south of the city center, which is seasonally fed by the Kattasai River from the Turkestan Mountains. The reservoir, which was filled in from 1965, has a capacity of 60 million cubic meters. The reservoir is intended to prevent flooding by the Kattasai, which devastated the city center in 1947 with a wave of mud. The lake also serves as a local recreation area.

The district ( nohija ) Istaravshan is composed of ten villages, each of which forms a sub- district ( jamoat ). In the west the district borders on Uzbekistan, in the north on the district Zafarobod, in the east on the district Ghonchi and in the south on the district Shahriston . Like Shahriston, Istaravshan District mainly exports potatoes.

history

Gate built on Mugh Teppa in 2002 to mark the 2500th anniversary of the city's foundation in the style of the medieval citadel.

The Iron Age began in the Fergana Valley in the 8th century BC. Several urban settlements were founded in the following centuries on the central reaches of the Syr Darya, including Nurtepe on the northwestern edge of the Istaravshan oasis. When in the autumn of 539 BC When the Persian Achaemenids under Cyrus had brought the city of Babylon under their control, the entire area from Asia Minor to Mesopotamia was under their control . From the following year Cyrus concentrated on the expansion of the northern border of his empire and advanced over Bactria to Sogdia and northwest to Khoresmia . In the northeast, the Persian Empire was threatened by the massagers and saks . To protect himself from the constant attacks of these horsemen, Cyrus had a number of fortified settlements built. This included the Kuruschata fortress near Jaxartes, which, according to Persian sources, dates back to the 6th century BC. Was secured with a triple wall ring. Kurushata (Kurukada) was the capital of the Usrushana region in the Achaemenid Empire and was probably the same place as Alexander the Great in 329 BC. And called the Greek authors Cyropolis. Alexander is said not to have succeeded in taking the city on the first attack. Only after an informant drew the attacker's attention to the open water gate, the troops entered the city and opened the main gates. Until 327 BC In BC Alexander was held in Sogdia to put down three uprisings in which, according to the Greek historian Diodorus, over 120,000 people were killed. While Igor V. P'yankov would rather locate this place at the site of the Shirin archaeological site, the majority of authors see the origin of Istaravshan in Kurushata.

According to the Chinese historical work Shiji , which was written before 90 BC. B.C., some Sogdians were among the traders who traveled to China. There is archaeological evidence that coincides with the information in Hou Hanshu about a somewhat more extensive trade on the northern route from the Black Sea through the steppe to China from the 2nd century AD. In the 2nd century AD, the City surrounded by a six kilometer long enclosure wall.

In the early Middle Ages the importance of Istaravshan declined and the settlement Bundschikat was expanded to become the capital of Usrushana under a local royal family, whose rulers carried the title Afschin in the 8th and 9th centuries. The heyday of this large fortified city with some palaces such as Chilhudschra and Urtakurgan in the periphery lasted from the 7th century to the first half of the 9th century.

Altstadtgasse with clay-plastered houses. The natural gas pipelines from the Soviet era have been shut down.

The local princes were under the rule of the Hephtalites from the end of the 5th century to the 6th century, and from the 7th century to the beginning of the 8th century under the rule of Turkic peoples , who lost their power to Arab rulers. The power vacuum that emerged after the death of the Arab caliph Qutaiba ibn Muslim in 715 was filled by local princes. In the period that followed, the region became involved in long-term power struggles with the Abbasids , who made Usrushana part of their caliphate and around the middle of the 9th century began to enforce their Muslim faith in Usrushana more emphatically than before. Around 1220, Genghis Khan's troops destroyed the city, killing a large part of the population or enslaved them. In the 14th century, the city was rebuilt under the Timurids and was now called Ura-Teppa (Ura-Tjube). Some nomadic Mongolian groups, who moved west from Mongolia in the 13th century and were known as Mangit , settled in the area of ​​Transoxania, among others, from the 14th century, where they adopted the regional Turkic language , and in the 15th century Nogaier were called. A leader of such a group called Khoja (Khwaja) Qazi Manghit became ruler of Ura-Teppa in 1503. This happened before the Uzbek dynasty of the Scheibanids took control of all of Transoxania in the early 16th century.

From 1709 to 1876 the Kokand Khanate existed in the Fergana Valley , the local rulers in the city were the Yüz emirs . In fact from 1747, officially from 1756, the Mangites ruled from Bukhara as a dynasty founded by Muhammad Rahīm (r. 1753–1758), the Khanate of Bukhara. Muhammad Rahīm fought several times against Uzbek tribal leaders and, among others, against the local rulers of Ura-Teppa, Nurota and Hissor . In 1754 the khans of Bukhara and Kokand, Muhammad Rahīm and Irdāna, joined forces to crack down on Ura-Teppa. Through the use of Muhammad Amīn from Hissor, who sent 8,000 men to support the besieged city, Ura-Teppa was saved from conquest and its independence was preserved in the further course of the 18th century.

The constant clashes between the khanates and the regional power centers continued in the 19th century. The cities of the Ferghana Valley with their coveted irrigated fields in the surrounding area came under the control of one or the other khanate, alternately. According to a travel report from 1843, Ura-Teppa was surrounded by a protective wall made of clay. The ruler of the city at that time was Khajeh Mahmud Khan, an Uzbek from Samarkand who nominally recognized the supremacy of Bukhara.

In the 19th century there were several national revolts of the people of the Ferghana Valley against their rulers, often with the aim of getting rid of the tax burden. The accession to the throne of the Manghite Amir Haidar (r. 1820–1826) was accompanied by a popular uprising, as was common with a change of power at the time. A Tajik uprising took place in Ura-Teppa in 1858. The son and successor of Amir Haidar, Nasrullah (r. 1826-1860), brought the region back under the control of the Bukhara Khanate in a campaign by executing the governor of Ura-Teppa, Rustambeg, and the governors of other places .

Sary Masor, restored mosque from the 16th / 17th centuries Century, behind it a new mosque

While the economic situation in the whole of Transoxania was difficult in the 18th century, according to written sources it recovered at the beginning of the 19th century. In the middle of the 19th century there must have been five coppersmiths in Ura-Teppa because their place of activity is known from the name suffix ( Nisba ) engraved on the objects . There were also ten kilns in operation for the production of pottery. Towards the end of the century, three gold and silversmiths were active in the city. These artisans, who are also reported from Bukhara and other cities and whose products are now well known from museum catalogs, speak for a flourishing trade of a wealthy urban population.

In 1897 the city had 20,837 inhabitants, the majority of whom were Tajiks and Uzbeks. About 300 Russians lived in the Russian quarter near the Citadel Hill. There was an Orthodox church, a telegraph office, a hospital and a Russian school. In the part inhabited by Tajiks and Uzbeks, there were over 1,800 houses and 65 mosques.

In 1865 troops of the Russian Empire conquered Tashkent in the fight against the khanate Kokand and took control of Jizzax (Jizzach), Khujand, Ura-Teppa and in 1868 over Samarkand a year later . From now until 1917 Central Asia was incorporated into the Empire as the General Government of Turkestan . Within this, Ura-Teppa was separated from the Emirate of Bukhara together with Samarkand and Khujand and combined to form a region ( okrug ) Serafshan. In 1886 the administrative regions were reorganized. Turkestan was divided into districts and sub-districts regardless of geographic, ethnic or other structures. The Tajik Soviet Socialist Republic , formed in 1929, received the western Ferghana Valley, delimited from the Uzbek Soviet Republic, with the capital Khujand and Ura-Teppa.

In 1935 the pass road between Dushanbe (then Stalinabad) and Ura-Teppa was opened (which was not passable in winter until the completion of the Schahriston tunnel in 2012). Before that, there was no road connection between central Tajikistan and the Fergana Valley. The industrialization of the Soviet Union in the 1950s resulted in population growth in the larger towns including Ura-Teppa. At the end of the 1950s, the larger cities in the Fergana Valley were connected to the Soviet natural gas pipeline network. Ura-Teppa received a drinking water supply. According to Konibodom (1959), a technical college was opened in Ura-Teppa in 1963.

In 2002, the city's 2500th anniversary celebrations were held, the historical starting date of which is fictional, as is the case of the Kulob 2700th anniversary celebration , which took place in 2006. Critics accused the government of wasting time in view of the luxurious celebration and the tight budget.

Cityscape

Destroyed mosque and madrasa Kok Gumbaz from 1420–1450. Photo from a six-volume Russian photo album on the cultural history of Turkestan published in 1871/72: Tуркестанский альбом, Turkestanskij Al'bom .
Portal of the Kok Gumbaz mosque

In 1974 the population was 36,000, for 2007 60,200 are given. The Kattasai, flowing from south to north, divides the city into two halves. The M34 thoroughfare with the name Lenin Street ( ulitza Lenina ) runs roughly parallel to the river through the middle, at the business center, market and minibus station on the east side of the river over a bridge and on the west side of the river to the north. The ulitza Oktjabrskaja turns in the east around the new town. The landmark visible from afar is the citadel hill Mugh Teppa (Mug Tepe, "Hill of Fire Worshipers"), which rises 1.5 kilometers north of the market. From there, the New Town from Soviet times can be seen to the east and the extensive old town ( Schahr-i Kohna ) to the west of the river.

The medieval citadel has disappeared. A city gate with a piece of defensive wall was rebuilt on the south side of the hill, the appearance of which does not necessarily have to match the original from the 16th century. From the 3rd century BC remains of the Sogdian fortress. A small remnant of the defensive wall and residential buildings made of adobe bricks have been preserved on the edge of the hill until the 3rd century AD. From the 5th to 8th centuries a two-story tower was uncovered, which is interpreted as a fortress or as a religious building. One of the oldest finds on Mugh Teppa is a bronze seal from the 4th to 2nd centuries BC. BC, on which a winged griffin is depicted, and a number of Roman denarii that document long-distance trade in the 1st century AD. There are also male figurines made of terracotta from the first centuries BC. BC, religious figures and objects from the 5th to 8th centuries and glazed ceramics painted red or green-brown from the 10th to 12th centuries. Mugh Teppa was excavated from the 1920s to the 1950s, most recently under the direction of Numan Negmatov.

The most important historical building in the old town is the mosque and madrasa Kok Gumbes (Kok Gumbaz, Кок Гумбез, "Blue Dome "), which was built under the Timurid ʿAbd al-Latif (Abdal-Latif Mirza, around 1420–1450). ʿAbd al-Latif was a son of Prince Ulugh Beg in Samarkand and was more conservative than his father, who was open to science and who he had deposed and murdered in 1449. The square main building with a central dome over a high drum is entered through a portal ( Pishtak ), the facade of which is decorated with turquoise-green and blue tiles in geometric and floral patterns. The mosque delimits an inner courtyard, which is surrounded on the other sides by the classrooms of the madrasa. The Koran school was closed during the Soviet era, today children are taught Islamkunde and general school subjects.

Havzi Sangin Mosque from 1910 in a walled garden in the old town. On the left under the roof a Taptschan .
Havzi Sangin Mosque, painted ceiling of the canopy

In the old town there are other mosques from the 18th and 19th centuries, which are often hidden behind walls. The mosques emerged from the 16th century in the vicinity of the citadel together with numerous mausoleums and secular public buildings, which are often characterized by colorfully painted wood carvings and stucco ornaments. The Havzi Sangin Mosque (Hauz-i-Sangin, "stone house") near Kok Gumbaz with a brightly painted wooden ceiling and plenty of carvings on the entablature was built in 1910. Another mosque, Chahor Gumbas (Chahor Gumbaz, "four domes"), from the 19th century in a secluded alley some distance away has four domes and a central column. In their garden there is a water basin with a tree that provides shade. The Bobo Tago mausoleum is on the northwestern edge of the old town. The two-room dome with a portal dates from 1500 or 1518. The Ivan was added in 1899. The larger of the two rooms made of square bricks served as a visiting hall / prayer room for the pilgrims ( zijoratchona , from Arabic ziyāra , "pilgrimage" and chona , "house"). Next to it is the smaller grave room ( gurchona ). Some of the houses are traditionally made of mud bricks or field stones and plastered with clay, some have intricately carved gates that lead to inner courtyards.

Sary Mazar (Sar-i Mazor, Сары-Мазар) is a large mosque complex located on the edge of the old town on Lenin Street. Inside the square, which is surrounded by a brick wall, there is a new mosque that can hold 1000 worshipers, the Namozgoch mosque from the 16th and 17th centuries. Century and two mausoleums from the 15th / 16th centuries. Century. The old mosque in the Central Asian style with a porch supported by 28 wooden columns has an intricately carved and painted roof structure. During the Soviet period, the mosque was used as a grain store. A free-standing brick minaret belongs to the mosque. One of the mausoleums bears the modern name Adschina Chona ("House of Demons"), the origin of which is unclear. The small domed building is empty today. The second mausoleum from the 18th century is dedicated to Hazraji Mekhdoni Azam (Hazratischach) and his relatives. He was a nephew of the Sufi scholar Sayyid Ali Hamadhani (1314-1384), whose tomb is venerated in Kulob . The largest mosque in the city with white and black marble on the facades is the Jomi Muhammad Ikbol . It stands on the site of a mosque from the 17th century in the middle of the old town and can accommodate up to 2500 people.

There are two to three simple and very simple hotels on the market square and on Lenin Street. In the mornings, several restaurants on the market are open for the marketers. A remnant of the medieval gold and silversmith's tradition of craftsmanship are the blacksmiths near the market, which make utensils such as snow chains and jewelry knives. Traditional wood processing is still in demand. A food processing industry and a textile industry are important for export.

literature

  • Ura Tyube. In: Jonathan M. Bloom, Sheila S. Blair: The Grove Encyclopedia of Islamic Art and Architecture. Volume 1. Oxford University Press, Oxford 2009, p. 375.
  • Robert Middleton, Huw Thomas: Tajikistan and the High Pamirs. Odyssey Books & Guides, Hong Kong 2012, pp. 168–171.

Web links

Commons : Istaravshan  - collection of pictures, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Northern Tajikistan, the middle of 1st millenium. National Museum of Antiquities of Tajikistan
  2. ^ Igor V. P'yankov: Cyropolis. In: Encyclopædia Iranica .
  3. ^ Syrdarya Basin Water and Energy Complex. In: Daene C. McKinney, Amirkhan K. Kenshimov (Ed.): Optimization of the Use of Water and Energy Resources in the Syrdarya Basin under Current Conditions. Volume I: Regional Groups. US Agency for International Development, June 2000, p. 47 ( caee.utexas.edu ).
  4. ↑ Vadim M. Masson: The land of a thousand cities. Bactria - Khorezmia - Margiane - Parthia - Sogdia. Excavations in the southern Soviet Union. Udo Pfriemer, Wiesbaden / Berlin 1987, p. 99.
  5. ↑ Boris I. Marshak, NN Negmatov: Sogdiana. In: BA Litvinsky (Ed.): History of Civilizations of Central Asia. The crossroads of civilizations: AD 250-750. Volume III. (= Multiple History Series. ) UNESCO Publishing, Paris 1996, p. 262 ( ru.unesco.org PDF);
    MA Dandamayev: Media and Achaemenid Iran. In: János Harmatta (Ed.): History of Civilizations of Central Asia. The development of sedentary and nomadic civilizations: 700 BC to AD 250. Volume II. (= Multiple History Series. ) UNESCO Publishing, Paris 1994, p. 44.
  6. ↑ Étienne de La Vaissière : Sogdian Traders. A History (= Handbook of Oriental Studies. 8th section: Central Asia. Volume 10). Brill, Leiden / Boston 2005, p. 38 f.
  7. ^ Jürgen Paul : Central Asia . Frankfurt am Main 2012 ( Neue Fischer Weltgeschichte , Volume 10), p. 358
  8. ↑ Anke von Kügelgen: Manghits. In: Encyclopædia Iranica.
  9. ↑ Mir Izzet Ullah: Travels beyond the Himalaya . In: Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society of Great Britain and Ireland. Volume 7, No. 2, 1843, pp. 283-342, here p. 327 JSTOR 25207596 .
  10. ↑ Victor Dubovitskii: The Rise and Fall of the Kokand Khanate. In: Frederick Starr (Ed.): Ferghana Valley: The Art of Central Asia. (= Studies of Central Asia and the Caucasus. ) ME Sharpe, New York 2011, ISBN 978-0-7656-2998-2 , p. 64.
  11. ↑ A. Mukhtarov: The Manghīts. In: Chahryar Adle, Irfan Habib (Ed.): History of Civilizations of Central Asia. Development in contrast: from the sixteenth to the mid-nineteenth century. Volume V. (= Multiple History Series. ) UNESCO Publishing, Paris 2003, pp. 56, 58, 60.
  12. ^ A. Ivanov: Applied Arts: Metalwork, Ceramics and Sculpture. In: Chahryar Adle, Irfan Habib (Ed.): History of Civilizations of Central Asia. Development in contrast: from the sixteenth to the mid-nineteenth century. Volume V, pp. 628, 639, 645.
  13. ↑ Vladislav Ivanovich Masalsky: Ura-Tjube . In: Энциклопедический словарь Брокгауза и Ефрона - Enziklopeditscheski slowar Brokgausa i Jefrona . tape 34 a [68]: Углерод – Усилие. Brockhaus-Efron, Saint Petersburg 1902, p. 895–896 (Russian, full text [ Wikisource ] PDF ).
  14. ↑ Ravshan Nazarov: The Ferghana Valley in the Eras of Khrushchev and Brezhnev. In: Frederick Starr (Ed.): Ferghana Valley: The Art of Central Asia (= Studies of Central Asia and the Caucasus. ) ME Sharpe, New York 2011, ISBN 978-0-7656-2998-2 , p. 152, 155.
  15. ^ Tajikistan. Trends in Conflict and Cooperation. (PDF) Swiss Peace, FAST International, April – May 2007
  16. ^ A priceless gem of Tajikistan. infoshos.ru.
  17. ↑ K. Baypakov, Sh. Pidaev, A. Khakimov: The Artistic Culture of Central Asia and Azerbaijan in the 9th – 15th Centuries. Volume IV: Architecture. International Institute for Central Asian Studies (IICAS), Samarkand / Taschkent 2013, p. 123 f.