Бесплатный фрагмент - Nomadic History of Ulytau

In the name of Allah, the Most Gracious, the Most Merciful!

Whatever the circumstances, to revive the good names of our ancestors and renew historical remembrance of the deeds and words of past generations is a sign of sanctity.

Yet this blessed work is attainable only through the efforts of worthy and distinguished descendants, and of respected heirs under the guardianship of the Lord of the Worlds and with the approval of the Almighty.

(Rashid al-Din Fadlallah Hamadani)

Dedicated to the 30th Anniversary of the Independence of the Republic of Kazakhstan

Introduction

In this book we recount the history of the Ulytau region, drawing on the works of medieval chroniclers, researchers of the Imperial and Soviet periods, the results of archaeologists’ and anthropologists’ work, as well as studies by contemporary scholars.

Any attempt to adapt existing historiography to the everyday texture of events in a given period has a right to error and may be challenged by alternative lines of interpretation. For that reason, we do not compel anyone to treat what is written here as sacred scripture; we merely offer our own reading of these events.

Medieval chronicles are of particular importance for research like ours, because they were closer to the events we discuss. Gardizi, al-Biruni, al-Idrisi, Rashid al-Din, Abulgazi, and others left a treasure of historical information for modern inquiry. Their works open new horizons for the local study of the Ulytau region.

Imperial Russian historiography provides information through a Eurocentric lens, yet it also preserves a number of facts that — down to the smallest detail — shed light on various aspects of steppe life among the “Kirghiz.” The detailed study of Kazakhstan became a necessity under the colonization of Kazakh clan lands; therefore expeditions sent by Tsarist Russia sought to convey thorough information about the history, geography, and ethnography of local inhabitants.

The official historiography of the Soviet state, packing its voluminous publications with the pathos of propaganda, naively believed it was engaged in the “sacred task” of educating the rising new generation; in doing so it moved one-sidedly away from the very essence of presenting history, erasing facts inconvenient to ideology and sometimes crossing out entire periods of history. Yet even here Soviet academics and professors managed to conceal valuable — one might say encoded — information on various topics. If the authors of studies ran into the need to emphasize the significance of events as “feudal survivals” or “exploitative elements,” they had to glorify V. Lenin as an extraordinary historian and the founder of the Soviet school of historiography.

The ideological concealment of another side of history created a vacuum for revealing this unstudied side over the past thirty years. If, in Soviet historiography, opponents of the Soviets appeared to the reader as nothing but “rebels,” “bandits,” “Basmachi,” and “enemies of the people,” then after the fall of the Soviet Union research, on the contrary, often shifted into the mode of “condemning” everything associated with the Bolsheviks.

Local-history works on the history of Ulytau written during the years of independence can be counted on one’s fingers. Moreover, many of them were written not by professional historians or local enthusiasts, but by people hunting for a way to fill an empty niche in national history. Often these were philologists or journalists who could elegantly spin an invented plot, mythologizing the essence of the narrative, while lacking basic source-critical knowledge.

A lack of chronological order, deep study of chronicles and sources, the authors’ lack of courage to depart from traditional principles ingrained — again — by the same Soviet ideology, and, in general, a fear of “getting hit on the head” in debates with dilettante circles that are always ready to politicize any “extraordinary” research, have led to various errors. For example, the redoubt of a Siberian Cossack regiment was taken for a medieval fortified settlement and to this day is called Khan ordasy. Bolgan Ana is perceived as the daughter of Jochi Khan, and Dombaul has been “made younger” to the time of Chinggis Khan and is even named the father of Ketbuqa.

On the one hand, such mistakes are unforgivable for historiography; on the other, they create a field of work for us. Our task is to correct all these shortcomings, substantiating every correction in this book.

Our narrative is more informational than interpretive, because we are still at the stage of filling gaps in the historiography of the Ulytau region. The first encyclopedia in the region’s history — Ulytau. Ulytau audany. Encyclopedia, published under the editorship of S. S. Kozhakhmetov — was only an attempt to take a first step toward a detailed study of Ulytau’s history and to gather articles of an encyclopedic nature into a single volume. At the same time, it was a continuation of the scholarly research of the region by Alkey Margulan and Zhuman Smailov, and of the publicistic study by Kuanysh Akhmetov. The encyclopedia pursued the goal of collecting these details in short entries without deep scholarly analysis and without involving, in the editorial board, scholars who had studied these topics professionally.

The direction we have chosen for this book is a continuation, a synthesis, or perhaps even a conclusion of all the inquiries we have conducted in recent years while bringing the history of the Ulytau region to light. Event-based studies of Ulytau were often limited to the period of Chinggisid rule or the Kazakh Khanate, while in descriptions of architectural and archaeological monuments authors frequently explained their origins superficially — presenting the first convenient viewpoint without searching for alternative hypotheses.

In order to dedicate our work to a broader readership and taking into account society’s growing demand today for “historical nourishment,” we tried to reduce the academic dryness of our work. Of course, it is difficult to follow this approach strictly: if medieval chronicles give us fragmentary information, then nineteenth- and twentieth-century archives, by contrast, abound in detailed statistics.

Scholarly and chronicle-based attention to Ulytau runs through world historiography from Herodotus and Strabo to modern archaeological investigations. Ancient Greek historians left valuable information about the Saka-Issedones, whose royal burial mounds still adorn the western spurs of the Ulytau mountains near Kulmagan and the Erden mausoleum. In Soviet historiography, the Issedones are known under the ethnonym “Chud.” Muhammad al-Idrisi, Gardizi, and al-Biruni wrote about the Ulytau Oghuz.

At the same time, during the era of Chinggisid rule, Ulytau became a kind of forbidden or protected zone — a qoruk (khoruk) — a place for the burial of kings and khagans, to which outsiders were not admitted. We do not encounter any testimony about the life and customs of Ulytau as a horde or as the center of the Ulus of Jochi in the works of medieval travelers and Catholic missionaries such as William of Rubruck, John of Plano Carpini, and Marco Polo, although some modern researchers attempt to change or shift their geographical information onto the territory of Ulytau.

Only in the time of Emir Timur do Central Asian chroniclers begin to write about Ulytau. On the campaigns into the Kazakh steppe of Abdullah II and Timur, Shash and Samarkand chronicles reported. “Abu’l-Ghazi writes about Ulytau, ‘which is well known.’ We draw a detailed genealogy of the Jochids from Qadyrgali Zhalayiri.”

With the strengthening of the Muscovite state and the territorial expansion of the Romanov Empire, diplomatic missions and military expeditions began to arrive in Ulytau ever more frequently. They carefully studied the region’s geography, history, traditions, and the everyday life of the local population. Especially under Peter I, the collection of archaeological material from the “frontier lands” began, including from Kazakhia. This process unfolded against the backdrop of predatory excavations carried out by so-called “kurgan diggers,” who had nothing to do with archaeology. They pursued a single goal — to profit from gold artifacts. “As early as January 1716, a collection of gold objects was received from M. P. Gagarin: plaques depicting lions and other animals. In December, another batch of gold items arrived.” (Rudenko, 1962, p. 11).

Rich material on Ulytau is also provided by the travel diary of Captain N. P. Rychkov, written during his journey in 1771. Rychkov was attached to punitive troops sent in pursuit of the Volga Torghuts. In Kazakhstan’s history this episode is known as the “Dusty Campaign.”

A work that is openly destructive for the historiographic tradition surrounding “Chinggisism” is Ya. P. Gaverdovsky’s Survey of the Kirghiz-Kaisak Steppe, published in 1804, where the role of Ulytau is presented in a completely different light in the interpretation of the history of Chinggis Khan’s empire. We devoted special attention to this work because in the research community it is recognized as a book providing encyclopedic information.

Information about monuments in the Karatorgay River valley and the Arganaty Mountains was left by A. Geins, whose article — devoted to the results of his expedition — was published in 1898. Descriptions of Ulytau’s archaeological sites were recorded by the engineer A. P. Shrenk, and in P. K. Uslor’s diary we find notes on kurgans located in the foothills of Ulytau and along the Kengir River.

A. I. Levshin’s historical topography, M. Krasovsky’s notes, and the materials of Sh. Ualikhanov are invaluable sources for researchers of the Ulytau region. Of particular importance for writing our book were the Materials on Kirghiz Land Use, which provide a detailed topographical and statistical description of the area we study.

The materials on historical monuments that K. I. Satbayev gives in his works became a guide to the direction of our work — not only for us, but for all researchers of our region. The multi-volume work of A. Kh. Margulan further enriched the source base on Ulytau, while the archaeological data of Zh. E. Smailov became foundational material in our work on the book.

This entire source base made it possible for us to radically revise interpretations of historical events across different periods. The reason is that studying the full range of material in no way allows one to remain within the framework of traditional historiography, which took shape under the diktat of Soviet ideology.

The Stalinist standardization of Kazakhs’ historical consciousness and the complete Sovietization of society begin in 1928. Religious upbringing was displaced by atheism; national spiritual and material values became hidden attributes of life; historical scholarship became an obedient servant of Bolshevik ideology; and many studies by Kazakh historians who presented a realistic picture of Kazakhstan’s past were declared pseudoscientific works with a “nationalist bias.”

The main goal of Stalinist historiography was to create prerequisites for uprooting the historical memory of the Turkic peoples and for a systemic erasure from self-awareness of the former greatness of nomadic civilization. This process proceeded on many fronts: through the forcible imposition of class struggle, persecution of “dissenting nationalists,” and the driving of the research community into rigid limits under ideological pressure.

The generations of the 1930s–40s still managed to inherit at least some values from the previous bearers of historical knowledge — those who miraculously survived the famines of the 1920s and 1930s, as well as the mass repressions carried out throughout the Stalinist tyranny. But the generation of the 1950s–60s ultimately absorbed Soviet ideology as a lens of spiritual development, and it is precisely they who, in the years of Independence, experience a painful process of modernizing historical consciousness. We hope to make a modest contribution to restoring what was lost during the period of ideological diktat — namely, the logic of our national historiography.

Through the prism of Kazakhstan’s historical heritage, in our view, Ulytau should be considered as a political center of Iron Age and medieval states. By separating the ruling headquarters — ordos/camps — from other historical and archaeological monuments of Ulytau into a distinct group of architectural and material values, we pursue the aim of highlighting the role of these monuments as a fundamental feature in interpreting historical processes in the region and their influence on the formation of medieval nomadic states and on the development of the region’s political, economic, and socio-cultural life.

The main ideas of our book took shape over many years through the study of the literature whose list we, in keeping with historiographic tradition, provide at the end. No historical work can do without references to the studies of scholars from different eras. In working on the book, we returned to the pages of these works in order to recall specific moments and to emphasize focused themes through citations.

To avoid misunderstandings in the interpretation of the context of individual studies, the excerpts we took from various works are placed in quotation marks and italicized. Moreover, in most cases we refrained from commenting on reports summarizing the archaeological work of A. Margulan and Zh. Smailov and considered it appropriate — by italicizing — to provide full descriptions of these works in the form in which those records are presented in their writings.

As L. N. Gumilev noted, “the problem of excessive information occupied the best minds of historians” thousands of years before us. A vast number of historical facts can fatigue the reader, so we considered it appropriate to concentrate attention on a specific classification of the region’s historical monuments, using a large number of footnotes — so as not to stray far from the topic and, at the same time, to provide complete information on the points under consideration.

In our view, local history studies have always played a leading role in the detailed exploration of a particular theme, which has consistently had a productive effect on research results. This is explained by the fact that studying a local territory does not scatter us across immense steppe spaces, but instead concretizes the historical fact through a clear understanding of all the characteristic features of the region being studied.

In our research we adhered to the principle of studying history strictly in accordance with reliable documentary facts, material evidence, archaeological data, and medieval chronicles. Relying on information about the results of archaeological excavations, one must keep in mind that the artifacts found — like the cultural layer, wall ruins, and so on — are residual materials of research. And medieval sources may have been written by chroniclers who pursued particular political or propaganda aims — for example, to glorify the ruler at whose court the author of the chronicle resided.

Therefore, the facts we propose are open to discussion and are not a final verdict in the study of any single problem. At the same time, one must not forget that, when disagreeing with a given position, it is necessary to present evidence for one’s refutation. This is because some opponents simply disagree for the reason that they lack sufficient information and a chain of logical reasoning on the topic.

The viewpoints of individual researchers cited in the book should be perceived only as a detonator for reflection on a given problem and not as grounds for a definitive conclusion. This also applies to the oral genealogical traditions — shezhire — on which researchers of various historiographic periods rely, and which play a significant role in assembling the mosaic picture of historical facts. Despite certain inaccuracies, etymological distortions, and mythologization, shezhire have every right to be used in historians’ works as a source.

We, for our part, seek to demonstrate that nomadism as a way of life functioned as an economic component within the economic systems of medieval steppe states, and that metallurgical settlements and major trade centers played an important role in their life — an inevitable coexistence under the political hegemony of medieval steppe peoples.

On the territory of Ulytau District — or, as the geographical name is often used, Western Saryarka — there is a whole series of ancient and medieval monuments covering the period from the Paleolithic to the modern era. However, the conventional boundaries of the Ulytau region diverge somewhat from today’s administrative-territorial borders. For example, the settlement of Olke lies within the administrative territory of Zhanaarka District, although it forms part of the complex of Ulytau’s unfortified towns of the Ak Orda period; and Tanbaly Nura — the principal rock-documentary “signature” of Ulytau as a symbol of steppe unity — is located in the territory of South Kazakhstan Region, only 20 km from the administrative border of Ulytau District.

The conditional historical-geographical boundaries of Ulytau were first proposed by Ya. P. Gaverdovsky by defining the natural characteristics of the Ulytau Mountains. The next regional features were described by the officer Krasovsky, and in 1897 the Chermak expedition determined the topographical boundaries of Atbasar Uyezd, thereby delineating the territory of the Ulytau region. In Soviet times all these data were supported by K. I. Satbayev. In 1935, in an article on this topic published in the newspaper Sotsialistík Qazaqstan, he defined the main boundaries of the region with an area of approximately 100,000 km².

In the 1990s, archaeologist Zhuman Smailov — who over 20 years conducted archaeological excavations and made a major contribution to the study of the region — proposed clear spatial parameters for considering Ulytau’s historical sites, based on fieldwork and large-scale excavations. In his view, the boundaries of the complex of Ulytau archaeological monuments run as follows: in the north — from the upper reaches of the Terysakkan and Karatorgay rivers; in the east — from the middle course of the Sarysu River and Mount Zheldyadyr; in the south — from the expanses of the Betpak-Dala desert; in the west — the Aral Karakums and the valleys of the Uly Zhylandsik and Karatorgay rivers. These spaces have since ancient times been inhabited by farmers, herders, miners, and metallurgists.

An enormous scholarly contribution to the study of the region was made by A. Margulan, K. Satbayev, N. Valukinsky, A. Kuznetsov, S. Zholdasbayev, Zh. Kurmankulov, Zh. Smailov, and others. The first comprehensive archaeological study of Ulytau’s historical and cultural heritage was carried out by Alkey Margulan, who, beginning in 1946, over nearly 30 years gradually discovered the region’s archaeological sites. The work he began as head of the Central Kazakhstan Archaeological Expedition (hereafter — CKAE) continues to this day.

Relying on the material listed above, below we will speak about the formation, flourishing, and decline of nomadism in the specific Ulytau region. We hope that this work will make it possible to view the history of our land in a new — and more distinct — way.

Chapter I. The Earliest Campsites, Metallurgical and Pastoral Settlements of Ulytau

When we speak of Ulytau, we refer to the entire low-mountain chain of Western Sary-Arka that connects three parts of the mountain cluster: the northern part — Arganaty; the central and highest part — Ulytau; and the southern part — Kishitau. Ulytau is the oldest mountain massif in Kazakhstan by geological age, occupying the western part of the Karaganda Region. The main mountain body consists of bare, rocky granite dissected by gorges, where runoff channels function predominantly in spring. On the slopes, rich in underground reservoirs of meltwater, birch and poplar groves are encountered. The north – south extent of Ulytau is approximately 200 km. The highest point is Mount Aulietau (Akmêshit), 1,131 m. Geographically, Ulytau stretches from the upper reaches of the Terysakkan River in the north to Lake Telikol in the south, and from the headwaters of the Uly Zhylandsik River in the west to the middle course of the Sarysu River in the east.

If Ulytau is geographically set apart within a territory defined by a mountain massif, then the historical and political significance of the Great Mountains extends across vast spaces of Eurasia. Ulytau embodies the significance of political power that nomads projected onto these expanses during the Iron Age and the Middle Ages. From here the mungul troops of Oghuz Khagan began their path of conquest. Here swept the hordes of the Huns, seeking their place in a steppe that was fading as a result of the Great Drought. Ulytau became a place of revival of the mungul state in the person of the Oghuz. From here the Kangar – Pechenegs departed for the Ukrainian steppes, pressed by the Oghuz. Ulytau became the political center of the Chinggisids. Here, in 1223, Chinggis Qaghan established the headquarters (stavka) of the largest ulus — the Ulus of Jochi.

The Ulytau region occupies a special place in historical scholarship in light of the study of events that unfolded over many centuries of human history. In the words of historians, Ulytau is renowned as a rich informational and material treasury of the mungul, Kangar – Pecheneg, Oghuz, Ak Orda, and Kazakh periods in the history of the Great Steppe. It was a place of consolidation of steppe power that controlled the transit of goods carried by merchants along the banks of rivers in the Sarysu basin.

Having examined the results of archaeological research over the last hundred years, we came to the conclusion that settlement of the Ulytau region occurred in the Middle Paleolithic (140,000–40,000 BCE), when the Great Flood of the Prophet Nuh (Noah) took place. With the sudden onset of the Ice Age 100,000 years ago, the waters receded, and the descendants of Nuh dispersed across the land. The lineage of his eldest son, Japheth, began to master the expanses of what is now Kazakhstan.

Approximately in the 13th millennium BCE, the glacier that had covered much of the Northern Hemisphere began to melt. Thus the Ice Age came to an end. The period of melting of ice up to 2,000 meters thick corresponds to the appearance of the first campsites on the territory of the Ulytau region.

Such an assumption may well correspond to the Qur’anic and Biblical narratives of those events to which Rashid al-Din, Qadyrgali Zhalayiri, and Abu’l-Ghazi refer in their genealogical chronicles. According to the above-mentioned chronicle and genealogical traditions, as a result of that flood only those who were in the Ark survived; and according to Abu’l-Ghazi, after the Ark moored “to a mountain named Judi,” “all the people who disembarked from the ship fell ill. The Prophet Nuh, his three sons, and his three daughters-in-law recovered; all the other people died.”

After this, the Prophet Nuh sends his sons to different parts of the world — to develop uninhabited spaces and to multiply the human lineage. He sent the eldest son, Japheth, to the north; Ham — to the land of Hindustan; and Shem — to the land of Iran. Japheth settled in the interfluve of the Itil and the Yaik. He had numerous descendants from eight sons — Türk, Khazar, Saqlab, Rus, Ming, Chin, Kemeri, and Tauarikh.

In the Jāmi{ʿ} al-Tawārīkh, Rashid al-Din links the time of Japheth’s life activity with the formation of nomadism as the principal economic way of life of his state. At the same time, the chronicler characterizes Japheth as a ruler who established a form of governance based on the foundations of Sharia.

Naturally, the reader may object: How can that be? Islam arose in the 7th century, whereas the events under discussion took place long before that. Yes, that is so. But Islam as a religion was formalized after the final, definitive message came from the Almighty. Before that, He sent down to earth more than 120,000 prophets who explained to their peoples the words of the Lord of the Worlds.

n 1967, M. N. Klapchuk discovered the site Obalysai-1, located 4 km southwest of the former village of Zhetykonyr. During excavations, stone artifacts were found — pebbles, cores, and choppings. Klapchuk attributed Obalysai-1 to the end of the Lower and the beginning of the Middle Pleistocene, that is, to around 400,000 years ago.

In the early 2000s, archaeological research on Ulytau’s Stone Age sites resumed. As a result of the CKAE’s work from 2001 to 2012, in the very first year O. A. Artyukhova, D. S. Baygunakov, and G. T. Bekseitov discovered 11 monuments in the Taldysai microdistrict dating from the Paleolithic to the Eneolithic. These include the sites of Toktagul, Ulken Zhezdy, Taldysai-3, Ayakbulak, Taldybulak-1,2,3, Tasbulak, and Sarybulak-1,2,3.

Research at the Ulken Zhezdy site made it possible to conclude that the Taldysai microdistrict was inhabited in the Late Paleolithic, approximately in the 13th millennium BCE, precisely with the onset of glacial melting. Radiocarbon dating of Toktagul established human activity at the site on the boundary of the 7th–3rd millennia BCE.

The first settlers engaged in hunting and gathering. This is evidenced by artifacts recovered from the microdistrict’s cultural layer. Excavations revealed bone remains of kulan, argali, aurochs, saiga, as well as single bones of elk and horse. This was facilitated by favorable climatic conditions of that time, which correspond to the Atlantic period of the Holocene, characterized by dense vegetation, humid air, and abundant precipitation.

In the 3rd millennium BCE, climate aridization begins, leading to soil erosion and a reduction in precipitation. Accordingly, this results in a decline in wild animal populations, increased risk for farming, and growth in the number of domestic animals. This is indicated by the fact that in all Eneolithic layers — alongside the bones of kulan, goitered gazelle, saiga, and argali — bones of domestic animals were found: horse, cattle, and small ruminants.

Across all Taldysai settlements, archaeologists uncovered tens of thousands of blades, inserts for composite tools, scrapers made from flakes and blades, and artifacts in siliceous siltstones and argillites. In the upper part of the Eneolithic layer at Toktagul, fragments of ceramics, pieces of ore, and slag were found, indicating the beginning of metallurgy in the region.

One of the unique objects for archaeological study within the Baskamyr complex is the settlement of ancient metallurgists at Taldysai, located in the northern part of the complex at the confluence of the small Taldysai stream with the Ulken Zhezdy River. The metallurgical settlement of Taldysai is a place where a large and complex smelting center was concentrated. Particularly intense activity at the site is traced in the 2nd millennium BCE, as established by radiocarbon studies at the University of Cambridge.

Archaeological excavations conducted since 1992 by specialists of the CKAE affiliated with the A. Kh. Margulan Institute of Archaeology — with the participation of students from the History Faculty of O. Baikonurov Zhezkazgan University — have yielded a vast quantity of artifacts. Their study led to the conclusion that Taldysai was one of the important points for processing and smelting Zhezkazgan ores.

The site was included among the objects studied under the “Mädeni Mūra” (Cultural Heritage) program, and in accordance with this program substantial funding was allocated in 2004–2006, making it possible to carry out major excavations.

As a result of this work, numerous casting molds were discovered, indicating that — besides beneficiating copper ore — metalworking was carried out at the settlement through smithing. Taldysai craftsmen produced tools, various ornaments, needles, and knives, as evidenced by the smiths’ tools found, as well as chisels.

In addition, archaeologists discovered many copper ingots. This indicates that finished metallurgical products were produced here and that trade developed with peoples of Central Asia, Southern Siberia, and Western Siberia.

The Taldysai settlement was investigated through three excavation areas. Of particular interest was Excavation No. 1, an Early Andronovo workshop-dwelling of the first half of the 2nd millennium BCE. The excavation area was conventionally divided into western and eastern sectors, where two residential-industrial complexes were uncovered.

A distinctive feature of this excavation is the presence of the rim of a semi-subterranean dwelling pit characteristic of Andronovo culture, as well as a stepped form in the northern wall. A shaft-type metallurgical furnace was found here, connected by a well and adjoining a production area with a system of hearths and a semi-above-ground pit. Nearby, numerous small hollows, pits, and grooves were recorded.

Study of the technological process led researchers to conclude that Taldysai metallurgists used a complex production cycle and continually improved methods of metal production. This is indicated by the presence of closed-socket casting and handle-fittings, produced in above-ground furnaces. These furnaces resemble those of the Urals and Donetsk regions.

In addition, a characteristic feature of Taldysai is the presence of deep shaft furnaces, sunk 2 to 2.5 m, and semi-shaft (transitional) furnaces with a complex air-duct system. The physical and technological processes of furnace operation were determined by the method of slag analysis.

Within the residential-industrial complexes of Taldysai, traces of sacrifices were found, having the character of mythologizing the metallurgical cycle. As sacrifices, the Andronovo people chose horses and wild animals driven in both from arid areas and from well-watered expanses of the steppe.

The sacrificed animal carcasses were laid in flue channels. Notably — and mysteriously — human skeletons were also found in these flues. Moreover, human skulls were found above the furnaces. This is directly connected to the Andronovo funerary rite and to burials in the southern part of the Baskamyr complex, where the ashes of the deceased were placed in a ceramic vessel and, after burial, the group of graves was enclosed by a fence of flat stones.

Foreign scholars also participated in the study of Taldysai. South Korean researchers examined more than 200 ingot and slag samples using metallography to clarify smithing processes. In the United States, the ceramics were analyzed to determine the type of food stored in them.

A distinctive feature of Taldysai is the use by metallurgists of small furnaces for smelting Zhezkazgan oxidized copper ore, which is notable for occurring mainly in low-power clayey sandstones and consisting of azurite, malachite, and chrysocolla.

A characteristic feature of Zhezkazgan ore is its difficult processability. For example, during construction of the USSR’s first flotation concentrator at the Karsakbay copper smelter, English experience in beneficiating Zhezkazgan oxidized ore was applied. During Industrialization, samples of Zhezkazgan copper were tested in the United States, in the state of Arkansas, because their ore properties were identical to those of Zhezkazgan.

The abundance of water in the pool at the bend of the Ulken Zhezdy River allowed Taldysai craftsmen to smelt metal year-round. In winter, wells were used and ice was cut on the pool. Unfortunately, the excavation area is washed out annually by spring floods, destroying the exposed southeastern part of the settlement. Yet the study of Taldysai continues, and it cannot be ruled out that even after the publication of our book, science will obtain new results from further research on this monument.

The earliest metallurgical settlements of the Late Neolithic appeared in the Zhezkazgansai tract, as indicated by the identification of the cultural layer based on excavations conducted by Valukinsky and Kuznetsov. The settlements of Myilykudyk (Elyukudyk), Sorkudyk, and Aynakol have the lowest cultural layer dating to the Late Neolithic.

The Zhezkazgan settlements differ in age. They functioned for many millennia — from the Late Neolithic to the 17th century. Their cultural layers show signs of interruptions in habitation. This is associated with political changes occurring as a result of geographic cataclysms. Approximately every six centuries, a century-long drought came to the steppe, affecting the life of nomads.

The main and largest of these historical monuments of Zhezkazgan is Myilykudyk, or — as the local population called it at that time — Elyukudyk, meaning “fifty wells,” due to the numerous remains of copper-smelting furnaces in the form of well-like pits. The settlement area and traces of production activity exceeded 10 hectares, consisting of traces of semi-subterranean dwellings, household and storage premises, as well as workshops producing tools and metal goods. The production process at Myilykudyk continued until the Late Middle Ages.

This is also attested by Abu’l-Ghazi, who, describing the territory of the Oghuz state, writes: “To the east, the yurts of the Oghuz el extended to Issyk-Kul and Almalyk; to the south — to Sayram and the mountains Qazyghurt-tag and Karajyk-tag; to the north — to the mountains Ulyg-tag and Kichik-tag, where copper is mined.” Considering that Abu’l-Ghazi wrote the Genealogy of the Turkmen in the 17th century, one can confidently assign to this source the role of documentary testimony of copper mining in Zhezkazgan in that period, since the chronicler speaks of copper mining in the present tense.

Next in significance is the settlement of Aynakol, located 5 km east of the Kresto-Center mine, near the Nikolsky section. The settlement area is about 2 hectares. The lowest cultural layer reflects the Late Neolithic period. Here, remains of eight semi-subterranean dwellings were identified in the form of rectangular pits; similar remains of water-collection pits, storage pits, stone-lined wells, places of ore extraction and beneficiation, and copper-smelting furnaces were identified — as at Myilykudyk.

No less significant after Myilykudyk is the settlement of Sorkudyk, located 15 km north of Zhezkazgan and first investigated by A. V. Kuznetsov and N. V. Valukinsky in 1945. Across a wide area lie monuments from the Bronze Age and the medieval period, testifying to the existence of metallurgy here up to the cessation of the Great Silk Road’s functioning. The settlement is characterized by a complex water-intake system with channels and a dam, vestibule-like dwellings with massive stone walls of a later period. One and a half kilometers from Sorkudyk, another site of ancient metallurgists — Taskudyk — was discovered.

Zhezkazgan’s metallurgical settlements have certain distinctive features compared with monuments of Central Kazakhstan. Huge workings here reached 750 meters in length, 25 meters in width, and 5–7 meters in depth, indicating many centuries of copper ore extraction. The settlements were marked by a complex industrial cycle of copper processing and smelting.

According to approximate calculations by the English geologist Ball, over the entire period from the Late Neolithic to the 17th century, Zhezkazgan miners extracted about one million tons of ore, and metallurgists smelted around 100,000 tons of metal. However, if one takes into account extraction of the richest ore lying in the upper layers of deposits, it can be assumed that the volume of smelted metal could have been much greater. This can be judged from the production experience of the Karsakbay copper smelter, which — before the flotation plant was launched — smelted rich ore with 35% metal content. This ore was mined from 17 English shafts opened by the English geologist West. Therefore, considering the characteristic stratification of deposits, we may assume that processing of native metal nodules occurred at the initial stage, from which the workings began. This increases the estimated volume of metal smelted by ancient metallurgists — compared with Ball’s figures — to 350,000–500,000 tons of metal.

In addition, historical sources speak of large quantities of gold and silver possessed by Oghuz rulers of Zhezkazgan. This gives grounds to argue that medieval Zhezkazgan metallurgists were able to separate precious metals from copper ore — that is, they knew copper-smelting methods later refined at the Karsakbay smelter in the 20th century. At the same time, ancient inhabitants knew the patterns of occurrence of gold veins in quartz deposits around the Ulytau Mountains — that is, they possessed geological methods used in modern science.

Officers Krasovsky in the 1860s wrote that ancient workings were carried out by inhabitants possessing certain geological and production skills, which in no way corresponds to “Kirgiz who have not the slightest desire to engage” in mining and smelting.

At the same time, the Zhezkazgan settlements have much in common with other districts of Sary-Arka. They are characterized by features such as massive stone walls of semi-subterranean dwellings, large burial fields, deep shafts of impressive diameter, workings and quarries, spoil-heaps and dumps, and a great number of copper-smelting furnaces — forming, in Valukinsky’s view, an entire medieval plant at Myilykudyk. In addition, the CKAE uncovered accumulations of slag and tools of miners, smelters, and craftsmen at these settlements.

Zhezkazgan settlements are also characterized by fragments of numerous household and irrigation structures and water-storage dams forming artificial reservoirs — progenitors of today’s Kumolinsky, Kengir, and Zhezdy reservoirs. Within the complex of Zhezkazgan metallurgical settlements, archaeologists identified a large number of storage pits and water-bearing wells.

One unique feature of Zhezkazgan metallurgical settlements is the presence of a heating system within workshops and semi-subterranean dwellings. In these structures, channels ran along the sufa (raised platform), into which heat penetrated from the copper-smelting furnaces. Thus, in winter, the families of miners and metallurgists were provided with warmth, making it possible to pursue metallurgy and crafts year-round.

Upon arriving in Zhezkazgan, Alkey Khakanovich discovered that settlements such as Kresto and Zlatoust had been completely covered by new construction. The point is that before World War II, neither the English nor the Bolsheviks, when planning residential construction, cared about the problem of preserving archaeological monuments.

Nevertheless, in order to study the volume of copper deposits, even before the Revolution a trench was laid at Myilykudyk, where a dump of processed ore and mining tools were found. To determine the volume of beneficiated ore at Myilykudyk, broad and deep trenches were laid in 1939 on the initiative of K. I. Satbayev. During construction of the railway between the present-day settlement of Vesovaya and ChKM, cultural layers of this settlement were revealed. (Margulan, 2011, p. 57).

Metallurgical settlements were dominant actors in the region’s economy and were the main factor in trade relations between local polities and others. They were a principal support in replenishing the state treasury. Therefore, the production of copper and its trade were an important object of attention in the region.

Chapter II. Natural and Climatic Conditions for the Formation of Seasonal Pastoral Routes in Western Sary-Arka

In this chapter, we will delve a little deeper into the reasons for the formation of nomadism in Ulytau, so that a reader unfamiliar with the geographical features of Ulytau can gain a general understanding of the region’s nature, way of life, and economic characteristics.

From a natural-climatic standpoint, the Ulytau region is represented by a steppe area composed of marginal zones which, each in its own way, respond to and influence human economic life, reshaping activity according to needs in harsh living conditions. The sharply continental climate of the region is distinguished by an air-temperature amplitude of 80°C. Frosty Arctic anticyclones can at times persist for 10 to 40 days during the winter months, reaching temperatures of down to –40°C. A warm Atlantic cyclone sweeps and buries everything in its path and can operate for 3–10 days at a time, throughout the year. Cyclones cause snow blizzards in winter with characteristically zero visibility, and dusty sandstorms in summer. All these natural-climatic conditions across the whole territory of Eurasia have not undergone changes since the Holocene.

One of the most precise descriptions of the Ulytau region, given by the first researchers of Tsarist Russia, is found in Gaverdovsky:

“Continuous empty, bare, treeless and even, one might say, wild places, filled with ridge-like ranges and rather high stony mountains, with everywhere around them either elevated hilly or lowered level steppes — this alone constitutes its locality. The soil of the land for the most part consists of a layer of hard clay mixed with sand and lime, lying everywhere at a shallow depth upon a stony stratum. Vegetation here is insufficient. In its northern part the feather-grass Stipa predominates, while to the south, in abundance and varying in its kinds, is wormwood Artemisia. There is no continuous forest at all; only in the vicinity of high mountains and on the northern slopes do scattered trees occur here and there. Along the rivers, especially the Ishim and the Nura, there are alluvial spring-deposited silty chernozem layers capable of producing a good annual crop.

This whole country in general is waterless. The rivers flowing out of elevated points — forming as it were special reservoirs and separated from one another by great distances — have very little water here in summer and turn into lakes, and many of them dry up altogether. Rarely scattered across this expanse are stagnant water pits, and reed- and rush-overgrown marshy flats; and all waters, to a greater or lesser degree, contain a salty-bitter taste. Wells are always sought in low-lying places, and then only near salt pans. Heat extends throughout the summer from 25 to 30 degrees in the shade by the Réaumur thermometer. By contrast, winter — owing to the nature of dry clay rich in salts and saltpeter particles — rages so harshly that the Kirgiz can in no way remain here to nomadize without exposing themselves to the danger of losing their livestock. In May and in September periodic winds blow along this belt, bringing spring storms and autumn frosts and snow. At other times of the year the weather is steady; there are no rains; the air is generally dry, thin, and even penetrating; regarding other changes observed in this country, and the precautions necessary when traveling through it in order to preserve health, we have spoken in our journal.” (Gaverdovsky, 1804, p. 110)

We will not participate in the debate among researchers regarding the evolutionary change of climatic conditions in the Kazakh steppe; we will only acknowledge the regularity of cyclical fluctuations — an increase and decrease in precipitation, warming and cooling of the climate, humidity and aridity, high grass stand and the disappearance of many grass species. When and how these fluctuations occurred has been studied quite broadly in the scholarly community; therefore, in our work we limited ourselves to archaeological and historiographic data.

However, L. N. Gumilev’s hypothesis about the periodic shifting of Atlantic cyclones from north to south and back again may well serve as an explanation for the periodic cyclic replacement of some state and ethnic formations by others. We are speaking of century-long drought, which occurred approximately every six centuries and led to the disappearance of nomadic states on the territory of present-day Kazakhstan.

Gumilev explains this by the relocation of precipitation into the Volga River basin and back again — into the basins of the Syr Darya, Amu Darya, and Semirechye rivers. In the first case, drought occurs in the steppe and the Caspian fills; in the second, fertility returns and the levels of the Aral Sea and Balkhash rise. During drought, as a result of long and exhausting wars, full life disappeared in the steppe; and during the return of fertility, powerful state unions were created — such as the Saka, Turkic, Oghuz, and mungul empires.

Fluctuations in weather conditions in the steppe had century-long and annual cycles, as well as seasonal cyclicality, influencing the way of life of nomads. The inhabitants’ adaptability to these fluctuations developed over many centuries, beginning in Neolithic times. The spiritual and material culture of nomads is the result of adaptation to the elements of a sharply continental climate: fluctuations of air temperature, wind direction, seasons of blizzards and flooding, as well as the influence of precipitation and grass growth.

If sedentary civilizations depended more on cataclysms arising as a result of interstate wars, nomadism remained in constant dependence on natural-climatic changes — both seasonal and multi-centennial in character. Therefore, the mobility of nomads always contrasted with the immobility of sedentary ethnoses. Study of this condition of nomads led Gumilev to formulate a new scientific discipline: “Historical Geography.”

High solar radiation, strong overheating of the soil and scant precipitation in summer, as well as the sharply continental climate, excluded the possibility of developing non-pastoral forms of economy across the broad expanses of Ulytau — except for small pockets of agriculture around the ruling headquarters (stavkas-ordas) of the social elite and the settlements of metallurgists on the banks of the Ulken Zhezdy and Zhylandy rivers. On small agricultural plots, hard varieties of wheat, rye, and barley were grown; and metallurgists добывали copper, iron, manganese, tin, and lead, and engaged in their processing and smelting — separating gold and silver from copper.

Pastoral households were distributed across the entire steppe expanse of the Ulytau region, reaching the Ishim River basin and the southern forests of Western Siberia, predominantly migrating from April through the end of November. Winter grazing was possible south of the spurs of the Kishitau Mountains. North of those places, snow depth exceeded 30 cm and grazing was impossible there, since sheep can tebenev (graze by digging through snow) on their own only at a snow depth of 10–20 cm, and horses at 30–40 cm. Households made maximum use of livestock resources in the production and processing of meat and dairy products, wool, and also for draft transport. “Nomadism is one of the most rational ways of nature use and utilization of the scarce resources of arid regions occupying almost a quarter of the Earth’s surface.” (Masanov, 1995)

In winter, most of the Ulytau steppe emptied out, with the exception of metallurgists’ settlements and the palaces of the ruling elite, which remained stationary year-round and practiced household animal husbandry near the stavkas-ordas. In winter, a small number of animals were left there for sustenance, while the remaining herds were driven to the southern expanses of Ulytau — into the sands of Karakum, Borsyk-Kum, and Betpak-Dala. Keeping livestock in settlement corrals during winter was possible only with ensured haymaking and feed preparation.

The transformation of material culture forced political centers to build palaces and settlements to concentrate in them items not transportable for nomadic movement — such as metal, ceramics, and glass. All these items were part of daily life in those settlements, whereas the “specialists” of pasture migrations rid themselves of all of it, gradually replacing basic necessities with lightweight materials of leather, wool, and wood — convenient for loading onto a horse or camel and suitable for quick assembly and disassembly — such as the yurt, furniture, and leather vessels.

In comparison with Mongolia, where nomadism occurs year-round due to the elevation of Mongolian steppes at 1,500 m above sea level, the dense and even snow cover did not allow Ulytau herders to graze livestock throughout the year. Therefore, households were localized in camps or in southern expanses where permanent winterings were concentrated.

As for seasonal migration routes, one should note the regular similarity between the migration of wild animals — such as saiga, goitered gazelle, kulan, wild horses, etc. — and the movement of pastoral households along seasonal routes from north to south and back again. Evidence for this may be the meridional direction of the main nomadic movements. (Masanov, 1995) Therefore, one can unequivocally note the important role of hunting and its influence on the transition of steppe pastoral households of the Andronovo culture period to nomadic pastoralism. Ulytau’s nomadic routes formed along the paths of wild animal migration, which subsequently led to their physical displacement, freeing pasturelands for domestic livestock. Wild animals could survive only in places where nomadic households were absent.

Nevertheless, attitudes toward wild animals in the Middle Ages differed radically from modern realities. Ulytau no longer has the abundance of game described by Hafiz-i Tanish Bukhari in the Book of Royal Glory, in the chapter “The arrival of the warlike khagan on the bank of the Saryk-Su River”:

“The ruler [“Abdallah Khan], majestic as the sky, ascended the summit of that mountain and cast his gaze over an endless expanse, the length and breadth of which [only] the Lord knows. [The khan] stood there that day until the noon prayer and directed his thoughts to having the warriors gather many stones and build in this lofty, majestic place a high mosque, so that the pages of time might preserve the memory of the exalted deeds and glorious works of that mighty padishah — just as the sovereign whose place is in paradise, the pole of the world and the faith, Emir Timur-Kurekan, mercy and blessing upon him, during the campaign against Tokhtamysh Khan reached Ulug-Tag, raised the banner of camp on its summit for one day, and ordered the glorious army to gather many stones from the outskirts and erect a structure resembling a minaret. Stonemasons inscribed upon it the date of his majesty’s stay in that locality.

At that time a desire arose in the blessed heart of the mighty sovereign to enjoy hunting. The khagan, powerful as the sky, protected by the mercy and help of the Creator, went out to hunt…

In short, so much game was killed [lit. “collected”] in these steppes that the Muslim army, in scarcity of food, took only the fat and left the lean. Among various kinds of gazelles, [the warriors] found here such gazelles that in size are larger than a buffalo. The Mongols (mogul) call them kandagayi, and the inhabitants of the Dasht call them bulan [i.e., moose/elk]. The victorious army took great pleasure in the meat of the game.”

As can be seen from the text, medieval hunters also were not distinguished by rational restraint, but the presence of such wild animals as moose/elk points to a dramatic change in their numbers in the modern period. Nevertheless, the process of livestock-driven displacement of wild animals from their habitats began with the emergence of nomadic pastoralism. As livestock numbers increased, the amount of game decreased.

Undoubtedly, nomadism periodically trampled and eroded certain soil areas, causing minor harm to the grassy ground cover. It displaced wild animals from their habitual habitats, which led to a reduction in their numbers. Forest tracts were destroyed, used as fuel and as raw material for making dwellings, household utensils, and everyday items.

According to facts presented in the book Materials for the Geography and Statistics of Russia, Collected by Officers of the General Staff, published in 1868 under the editorship of Lieutenant Colonel Krasovsky, on the territory of Atbasar Uyezd the following wild animals were found: the steppe wolf; rarely, the silver-black fox; and often, the yellow-furred fox, as well as the corsac. In the southern and middle mountains of Akmola Region, the wildcat was often encountered; the snow leopard rarely entered the reeds of Balkhash. The Materials note that by that time there were no tigers in the steppe, but wild boars were everywhere.

Among ungulates, the officers recorded kulan in the southern steppe expanses; deer in the basins of the Syr Darya and Sarysu rivers; saiga migrating across the entire steppe following migratory birds depending on the season; the black-tailed antelope kara-kuyryk; and argali inhabiting mountainous areas. In addition to the wild animals listed above, the Materials provide a large list of other mammals, birds, fish, amphibians, and insects.

But heavy industry and 20th-century urbanization surpassed all these minor costs of nomadic economy and destroyed nomadism itself through the demographic catastrophe that occurred in the 1920s–1930s. Industrialization together with Collectivization violently broke all traditional foundations of the nomadic world, thereby not only disrupting the habitual rhythm of nomadic households but also окончательно destroying them once and for all. The mass cultivation of virgin lands finally put an end to the predominant role of animal husbandry in agriculture.

But let us return to the period under consideration — in the Middle Ages. Maximum utilization of the grass cover in the region led to various clashes of interest among different tribes, which entailed the transformation of ethnogroups and their постоянное biological mixing through the assimilation of “outsiders” into the autochthonous environment — shifting the existing power, expelling their close associates, and establishing new dynasties.

The смена of dynasties was written about by Abu’l-Ghazi in the Genealogy of the Turkmen:

“Thus, when they raised as sovereign someone from the Qayi, the Bayat uruq and another five or six small uruqs joined him. Likewise, when they raised as sovereign someone from the Salor, the Salor uruq and the Imir uruq and several other small uruqs joined him. Thus, when they raised as sovereign someone from the Yazyr, the Yazyr uruq and several other small uruqs joined him. From this draw a conclusion: they raised a sovereign from a small uruq, and small uruqs joined him; sometimes six or seven gathered, and sometimes three or four gathered. And it happened that they all were hostile to one another, raided one another, and took one another captive.”

Studying this topic and supporting it with archaeological data, we cannot agree with the view of some researchers that nomadism, as a set of economic actors, should be understood exclusively as highly mobile human activity with no territorial attachment whatsoever. The existence of the palaces and stavkas-ordas in Ulytau that we study points to a clear delineation of territorial spheres of governance, divided into a certain system of functioning pastoral households. There were permanent winterings, and there existed no less permanent routes of migration for households, with palaces localized on summer pastures; and permanent metallurgical settlements also functioned.

The end of these settlements’ existence may be limited to the 16th–17th centuries, which in general is confirmed by archaeological excavations. To substantiate this viewpoint, we will cite three reasons that influenced the cessation of life of the political steppe elite in Ulytau’s palaces:

— the final cessation of the Great Silk Road’s functioning after Christopher Columbus’s discovery of America and Europeans’ освоение sea trade routes;

— the onset in the steppe of the period known as the “Little Ice Age,” which led to the impossibility of nomadic movement in the Ulytau region due to prolonged winters lasting up to six months a year;

— a change in the geopolitical situation in Central Kazakhstan led to a tendency toward the absorption of medieval nomadic feudal-patriarchal society by Russian-European industrial imperialism.

Below is an English translation of your excerpt (kept in the same academic register and with key Kazakh/Russian terms preserved where they function as technical vocabulary).

Over the course of millennia, seasonal nomadic routes gradually took shape, and they finally stabilized in the second half of the 1st millennium CE. The Baganaly came to be pastoralists in the same way as the Adai, Tabyn, and the Anaz-related tribes of Sabaa, Ruala, Amarat, who lay within the zone where the “classical” type of nomadism formed — carrying out seasonal migrations of 2,000 km or more per year. They also became among the last nomads in Kazakhstan to end nomadism and to meet the Stalinist upheavals that forced nomadic households into designated “points of sedentarization.”

Before the adoption of the “Regulations” (Polozheniya) of Emperor Alexander II of the Russian Empire — under which Kazakh land was declared state (i.e., tsarist) property — the order of nomadic movement for pastoral households was established at councils (kurultais) of the ruling elite and was determined by the clan principle of land tenure. The formal private ownership of livestock is explained by the development of mutual assistance among all members of the clan, which created conditions in which a nomad’s survival alone was impossible. Therefore, in the nomadic milieu, expulsion from the clan was the harshest punishment for one or another offense.

The annual seasonal migration of the region’s herders from winter pastures to summer pastures proceeded in three directions. The Betpak-Dala route ran through a system of wells that ensured the movement of all living силы (people and livestock). The Sarysu direction followed the main water artery of the southern lower reaches of the Sarysu River, linking the urbanized Syr Darya zone with the steppe expanses of Western Sary-Arka. The Karakum route passed along the floodplains of small rivers transitioning into the Torgai basin and encompassed all pasturelands west of Kishitau, Ulytau, and Arganaty.

The Ulytau direction of nomadic movement is recorded in Qadyrgali Zhalayiri’s Jāmi{ʿ}at al-Tawārīkh. In the narrative of the origins of the Oghuz, a genealogy of the Prophet Nuh (Noah) is given, where his son and the khagan of all Turks is shown as Japheth (Abulzha). After the universal flood, Nuh divided the lands among his three sons, and Japheth became the father of all Turks. Japheth’s son Dib Yaquy was a powerful ruler whose army was well armed. He worshiped Tengri and nomadized within his father’s domains in the mountains of Ortag and Kertag. These mountains were also the possessions of Abulzha’s grandson Kara Khan.

In historiography there are three views regarding the location of the above-mentioned mountains Ortag and Kertag. The first researchers associate them with the Ulytau and Kishitau mountains, arguing for the regularity of a nomadic route from the lower and middle Syr Darya up along the foothills of Kishitau, Ulytau, and Arganaty. This viewpoint is supported by Abu’l-Ghazi, who narrates the following about Dib Yaquy’s elder son Kara Khan:

“Kara Khan summered in the mountains of Urtag and Kertag; they are now called Ulyg-tag and Kichik-tag. When winter came, he wintered at the mouth of the Syr River, in the Kara-Kums and in Bursuk.”

With a meridional (north – south) migration route, the toponyms Kertag (“the mountain indicating the return route of migration”) and Arganaty (“the far wing” of the Ulytau mountains) point to the regularity of this migration pattern.

The second group of researchers, such as A. Margulan, argues that Ortag and Kertag should be associated with the Ortau and Kyzyltau mountains. This position is also defended by Zhuman Smailov, who states that “the locality Urtak corresponds to the modern Ortau Mountains. Thus, we identify the mountains Ortag, Kertag in Rashid al-Din with the Ortau and Kyzyltau mountains in Central Kazakhstan.”

The third viewpoint identifies Ortag and Kertag with Karatau and Alatau. This was held by Gaverdovsky, who wrote: “Japheth, whom some Tatar writers, wishing to bring him closer to the beginning of the Turkic tribe, call Abulchzha-khan, had, in their opinion, his residence also in the Kirghiz steppe near the mountains of Kertau, now Karatau, and Artau, now Alatau, or Aktau.” (Gaverdovsky, 2007, p. 151).

At the same time, in interpreting his account of Türk’s son Mogul, Gaverdovsky writes:

“The Moguls, whom many call Mongols, but properly by the ancient pronunciation mungly (Mungl — in the ancient Turkic language means ‘gloomy’; perhaps this name was given because of a distinguishing trait of their founders, or because of the trait of the people itself, which arose from desert life and solitude, having great influence on the national character), had at first their main nomadizing in what is now the Kirghiz steppe near the mountains Ulutau, Kichiktau, and Karatau, and along the Syr River. The other parts of the steppe were occupied by other groups whose names are little known.” (Gaverdovsky, 2007, p. 152).

On the basis of the facts presented by Abu’l-Ghazi and Gaverdovsky, we consider it inappropriate to continue debating the localization of Ortag and Kertag. The general interpretation of events of those times, the regular placement of nomadic routes, and the study of Ulytau’s history allow us to state confidently that what is meant are the mountains Ulytau and Kishitau.

Migration routes (pastoral, hunting, caravan) ran along the channel of the Sarysu River and along the system of wells in the sands of the Karakum and Betpak-Dala. “Crossings depend on the distance between watering places and on the season. Traveling on average 25–30 versts per stage, a caravan can make up to forty stages, with rest from time to time for one or two days.”

The southern part of the Ulytau region is composed mainly of deserts and semi-deserts. For example, one sheep per year requires 5–7 hectares of land in the steppe zone and 12–24 hectares in deserts and semi-deserts. Therefore, the cyclic movement of pastoral households was refined throughout the entire transformation of nomadism in the region.

The winter nomadic camps of local clans were located in the sands that stretch across the southern expanses of the region. “On the northern side of the Aral Sea — Great and Little Barsukkum; to the east of it around Lake Aksakalbarbiy and along the northern side of the Syr River up to the Sarysu — Karakum; on the southern side of the Syr and partly near the Amu — Kyzylkum and Bakankum, which already occupy the northern part of Greater Bukharia; further east from the Sarysu spread Kourkum, Ich-Kungurkum and Aremetey; and finally appear the level sandy steppes of Bitpak stretching all the way to Lake Balkhash-Nor…” (Gaverdovsky, 2007, p. 112).

The features of these sands, along with Gaverdovsky, were described in different periods by Academicians Gmelin, Pallas, Lepekhin, by mining officers Pospelov and Burnashev at the turn of the 18th–19th centuries, and by Colonel Herberg in 1742. All sands of the southern outskirts of the Ulytau region lie in lowlands, absorbing the water resources of rivers flowing both from the north and from the south. Compared with sands south of the Syr Darya and Amu Darya, the Ulytau sands are relatively supplied with vegetation and in winter are quite suitable for feeding livestock. Camels are especially adapted to life in the sands; in winter they feel more comfortable here than in the north.

But not all clans had access to the warm sands, since scarce vegetation and limited water resources could not accommodate everyone. Therefore, many clans remained in winter along the banks of Ulken Zhezdy, Kengir, and the rivers of the Uly-Zhylandyshyk and Torgai basins. Only in severe winters — if hay was not prepared — some auls migrated urgently into the sands.

Although winter conditions in the sands were sufficiently comfortable, a high level of discomfort came in summer. If in the first autumn days the daytime temperature could reach +30°C, at night it could drop to +4°C. The reason was the coating of the earth’s surface with salt and clay which, due to the reflectivity of its structure, heats up quickly under the sun and — like a radiator — gives off heat; and at night, immediately after sunset, cools rapidly and gives off cold.

Under such conditions, inhabitants of the sands wore warm clothing that protected them in summer from heat and in winter from bone-piercing cold. Therefore, with the onset of spring, the main part of the clans migrated to meadow pastures along the Ishim (Esil) and Tobol rivers, saving themselves and their livestock from exhausting heat, while in the kystau (wintering places) remained relatives who carried out preparatory work for the next winter.

The Karakum sands consist of bands of yellowish-gray siliceous fine sand scattered irregularly at varying distances from one another. Constant winds brought here by the Atlantic cyclone pile up sandy heaps and hummocks lying like ridges and creating hollows where snow accumulates in winter and in spring feeds the roots of shrubs and thorny grasses with moisture. Alongside such relatively dense and deep hollows, one sometimes encounters sandy plains and sometimes layers of compacted clay.

Unlike African sands or the sands of the Gobi Desert, the Ulytau sands do not constitute “seas of sand,” but lie separately from one another and are surrounded by higher, hilly spaces. The sandy bands are oriented west – east, with lengths from 25 to 120 km, and widths reaching 5–25 km. This structure formed under the influence of winds brought here by the Atlantic cyclone.

Alongside the scarcity of vegetation cover, one of the main reasons for seasonal migrations was a shortage of water resources. Gaverdovsky writes on this:

“…this whole belt, as was already evident from the description of the mountains, rises above other parts of the Kirghiz steppe in its horizon; and although these mountains are flat, in their depths they everywhere contain a near-surface layer of hard rock which, due to its density, does not have enough channels (tubas communicatorias) that produce the mutual communication of waters and the cause of springs; and on the other hand because the mountains in the steppe, being low and presenting for the most part only smooth, flat ridges, are incapable of condensing clouds and moist vapors on their surface — therefore the possibility of an everywhere abundance of sources is entirely cut off…” (Gaverdovsky, 2007, p. 111).

A characteristic feature of the region’s “water capital” is the accumulation of water of high appropriate quality in the Ulytau mountain chains, occupying the territory from the Terysakkan River to the Karsakbay uplift; beyond that, water descends deeper into the earth’s crust, losing quality as mineralization increases.

Groundwater moves predominantly from north to south, and water pressure comes from the Ulytau mountains, which act as a natural barrier holding back precipitation brought by the Atlantic cyclone. Water resources move through vertical fracture systems determined by steeply bedded folds of rock that run meridionally (north – south).

“Such dissection of the relief creates good drainage conditions for groundwater, which in turn leads to the emergence of springs that are recorded in the low-mountain areas. All springs have small discharges (0.02–0.2 L/s). South of the Karsakbay uplift, water pressure decreases and mineralization increases, reaching 1.5–2 g/L in the area of the Bleuty River.”

Mountain rivers flow once a year, in the first half of April, for about one week. At this time, riverbanks fill with turbid meltwater flowing down-channel at considerable speed. In summer, rivers break into separate pools and are fed by precipitation as well as groundwater.

Around the Ulytau mountains, four groups of mountain rivers are concentrated:

— the Terysakkan group — rivers flowing toward Siberia;

— the Torgai group — rivers originating on the western slopes of Arganaty, Ulytau, and Kishitau and flowing toward the Torgai plateau;

— the Tengiz group — meaning the Bleuty (Kalmakkyrylgān) basin with numerous tributaries, beginning in the Karsakbay upland and disappearing in the Karakum sands while feeding many lakes of the Tengiz group (Koskөл);

— the Kengir group — rivers flowing from the eastern slopes of Ulytau and joining the Sarysu near Karazhar.

A specific feature of the Kengir group (Sary Kengir, Kara Kengir, Zhylandy, Ulken Zhezdy) is brief high-water flow and high current velocity during spring floods. A large amount of snow in winter accumulates precisely in the eastern part of the mountains, since blizzards carrying Atlantic precipitation from the southwest are largely restrained by the natural barrier of Ulytau’s eastern spurs. Yet the high-water pattern of these rivers differs from the Torgai basin, whose waters generally flow across flatter terrain; its channels are much wider and currents slower, resulting in fuller pools throughout the year. The Kengir rivers, by contrast, flow during spring melt and at high speed fill the Sarysu and contribute to the Syr Darya, feeding the Aral Sea with their cubic meters. Unfortunately, over the last 20 years these rivers have not been sufficiently full-flowing due to decreased precipitation. This is one of the signs, in the author’s view, of the approach of another century-long drought, which — according to L. Gumilev’s cHere’s an English translation of your new excerpt (same tone/register, with key terms like jüt and tebenevka kept as technical concepts and briefly glossed the first time).

As a result of such jüt (winter disasters leading to mass livestock die-off), mares first “cast off” the foal from the womb and then perish themselves. The impossibility of tebenevka (snow-foraging by digging through/ breaking snow cover) for horses condemned sheep to certain death as well, since they followed the horse herds that broke the crust of snow and then nibbled the finer grass left after the horses. For this reason, the desert and semi-desert lands of southern Ulytau were valuable winter pastures for all pastoral households of the region.

Ulytau’s forage base is poor due to the high aridity of its natural-climatic conditions and the increase in dryness from north to south. Vegetation productivity increases in mountain and foothill areas where precipitation brought by the Atlantic cyclone is naturally retained.

In terms of plant forms, the region is dominated by mesophytes (48.9%), xeromesophytes and mesoxerophytes (31.3%), and xerophytes (9.4%). In the desert zone, where vegetation adapts to minimal moisture conditions, xerophytes and halophytes prevail. (Masanov, 1995)

As a highly productive feed for livestock in the spring – summer period, meadow forbs are used; at this time of year they have high nutritional value, contributing to rapid weight gain. By mid-autumn — especially after the first frosts — reliable forage is provided by wormwood plants, which lose their essential oils as these volatilize by that time. Therefore, mainly in autumn and winter, livestock move from meadows to higher ground where the snow cover is thinner than in hollows and ravines, into which blizzards pack large amounts of snow, complicating tebenevka.

In those periods of the year when other pastures are exhausted, saltworts (solyanki) become fodder for livestock; their consumption also falls mainly in the autumn – winter period. In winter, vegetation from reed thickets is also used.

A distinctive feature of nomadic pastoralism in Ulytau was year-round grazing on natural pasture, with only limited localization of such хозяйства near дворцы-орды (palace – orde centers), where haymaking and winter hay stocks were prepared. Here, horses and small livestock were bred predominantly. Grazing occurred in close взаимозависимость (mutual interdependence) of each species with the others.

Horses played an important role in the life of the nomad, and their breeding had multiple purposes: as a meat-and-dairy source, as transport, as draft power, and as pack animals. The hardiness across seasons and the endurance of the Kazakh horse made it an irreplaceable support in the lives of nomads. Property stratification in society was determined by the number of horses in the herds. Kumys (fermented mare’s milk) was a staple of the steppe dweller’s diet.

Officers under Krasovsky noted that Kazakhs could easily do without drinking water and stopped on riverbanks only in order to supply water for their domestic livestock. They themselves, instead of water, “drink 5–6 large mugs of kumys and, slightly intoxicated, pass the time joking with one another.” (Krasovsky, 1868)

Since the time of the Andronovo people, males aged 2–3 years were slaughtered, while females replenished existing herds and formed new ones. Purebred stallions were kept to increase livestock numbers. The same selection system applied to sheep and cattle. This made it possible to maintain herd size and develop high productivity.

In short, the horse served as a symbol — an indispensable attribute — of the nomad’s life. It was not only a means of movement both in peacetime and in war, but also supplied food. Horses were hardy, could cover great distances, easily climbed steep rocky slopes, and crossed water obstacles. They were of средний рост (medium stature) compared to “Europeans” and the Mongolian horse. The Chinese dignitary Chao Cuo characterized the horses of the Xiongnu as follows: “In climbing mountain slopes and descending them, in entering mountain rivers and emerging from them, the horses of the Middle Kingdom yield to the horses of the Xiongnu.”

The role of the horse in seasonal pasture-based husbandry in no way diminishes the importance of small livestock. Sheep have high productivity and played a significant role in the diet of steppe peoples. According to Academician Toregeldy Sharmanov, if horse meat is digested in the human stomach in only 3–4 hours, and beef in 8–9 hours, then mutton is digested in 17–19 hours depending on the amount consumed — something necessary for a nomad living in a harsh climate and under high mobility. At the same time, Sharmanov argues that under modern conditions of urbanization and low mobility, city dwellers are contraindicated for mutton consumption; it is preferable to consume horse meat and, in proportion to the portion, beef. (Sharmanov, 2013)

In Ulytau, coarse-wool sheep of the мясо-сальное direction (meat-and-fat type) became adapted. They reproduce quickly: sexual maturity is reached by one year, and pregnancy lasts only five months. One sheep can yield on average 20–25 kg of meat, 2–2.5 kg of wool, and 4–5 buckets of milk. The absence of refrigeration in hot summer days made sheep an irreplaceable food source: the alternating slaughter of sheep by each family of an aul, together with an established system of kunachestvo (guest hospitality), enabled rational use of livestock products. Sheep’s wool and skin were indispensable raw materials for felt, clothing, and other household items.

Soil mineralization in the Ulytau region — rich in iron, manganese, copper, and other minerals — gave Ulytau sheep meat a distinctive taste compared to small livestock in other regions. Evidence of this may be the fact that in the 19th century, Russian merchants were willing to come to the annual fair in Atbasar only if the Baganaly arrived there with their flocks.

P.S. Pallas describes the sheep as follows: “Kirgiz sheep are very large… They are taller than a newborn calf and so fat that older ones, in a good season, weigh four and five poods. Instead of a tail they carry a fat rump (kurdyuk), which in large rams weighs from 30 to 40 pounds.” (Pallas, 1773, Vol. I, pp. 583–584). Mutton was the steppe dweller’s main food.

According to medieval sources, camels played an important role in nomadic logistics. In Ulytau they bred the two-humped Bactrian (nar), whose main feature is endurance in dry and hot climates. A nar could go without water for 10 days and carry a load averaging 200–350 kg. At the same time, a camel yielded on average 160–190 kg of meat, 60–100 kg of fat, and 4–8 kg of wool. A she-camel produced 40 to 80 buckets of milk over a 14–16 month lactation period. (Masanov, 1995)

However, camels required large grazing areas. In one session they could consume up to 100 liters of water, and they could not tebenev (snow-forage), meaning constant winter hay preparation was necessary. The camel’s long stride carried herds over great distances, creating additional burdens for the herder. Cold, rain, and dampness were the main causes of die-off and declining herd numbers.

One of the last historical episodes in which camels played a crucial role was the region’s industrialization process — namely, the construction first by the British and then by the Bolsheviks of the Karsakbay copper-smelting plant:

“Camels played a decisive role in the formation of the trust ‘Atbasцветmet’ — as the Karsakbay people called it, the ‘camel trust.’ Which was more effective in the total absence of road infrastructure: trucks or camels? Stepan Dybec and the ‘head of a transport department that did not yet exist’ argued about this for a long time. Which is more effective and rational — wheels or hooves, a truck bed or a hump? And two thousand railcars’ worth of cargo had to be moved across the desert!

The future head of the transport department nevertheless convinced Comrade Dybec to accept the leading role of camels in the steppe’s transport system. It was planned to hire 12,000 camels from the local population. Later practice showed that Dybec was wrong about trucks: the desert is merciless to metal and obedient only to the hardy, self-satisfied camels. Already at the initial stage of transport work, out of 20 “Zauzer’ trucks only seven remained on the line, while the rest stood in repair — at a time when the “ships of the desert’ proudly, slowly, but within the planned deadlines delivered their 240 kg loads. They mainly carried bread and necessary fastening materials.” (Seitzhanov, 2018)

Only with the construction of the Karaganda – Zhezkazgan railway did the need for camels disappear.

Thus, the natural-climatic conditions in Ulytau allowed the inhabitants of the region to practice nomadic seasonal pastoralism in meadow lands limited to local pasture areas in river floodplains. A subsidiary role in steppe households was played by agriculture, which could be afforded mainly by the auxiliary хозяйства of the aristocratic elite around rulers’ courts.

Only in the 19th century — due to the intensive colonization of northern Kazakhstan by the Russian Empire and the displacement of some clans into “low-cultivated” arid steppes, under conditions of growing crowding in the nomadic milieu — did new pockets of agriculture appear everywhere, and haymaking became more widely practiced.

Methods and means of survival in the Ulytau steppes were refined over many centuries and, until the collapse of nomadic culture, remained integral components of the way of life of the ethnoses living here. Material and spiritual values were directly connected with the practice of seasonal pasture-based pastoral economy, and medieval metallurgy and palace structures underscored their uniqueness.

Chapter III. Ulytau in the Iron Age

From Oghuz Qaghan to the disintegration of his empire

The historical figure discussed below merits a place in history comparable to that of “the Conqueror of the Universe” — Chinggis Qaghan. In recent years, historiography has increasingly studied the past in reverse, tracing a line back from the Alash movement, from Khan Kenesary, and from the khans Kerei and Zhanibek, and today it “recognizes” Chinggis Qaghan as the consolidator of all Turkic peoples. In this work, however, we seek to “revive” data largely lost within scholarly circulation about a monumental historical personality — Oghuz Qaghan, who is of tremendous importance not only for the historiography of Kazakhstan, but also bears direct relevance to the history of Ulytau.

Oghuz Qaghan may well be called the “Conqueror of the Universe” number one, and Chinggis Qaghan number two. Although we do not possess the same abundance of artistic and chronicle detail about Oghuz’s campaigns as we do about Chinggis Qaghan, Oghuz is nonetheless described at length in Rashid al-Din’s “Oghuz-nāme” and in the ancient epic “Oghuz Qaghan.” Later, Abu’l-Ghazi and Zhalayiri echoed the content of these works. According to these chronicles, we may state that Oghuz Qaghan conquered the very same territories later taken by Chinggis Qaghan and his descendants — namely China, Central Asia, and Persia. The only difference is that the descendants of Chinggis Qaghan failed to take Egypt, whereas Oghuz Qaghan did.

A reader may reasonably ask what Oghuz Qaghan has to do with Ulytau. The answer is unequivocal: according to all medieval chronicle sources, Oghuz Qaghan has a direct connection to our region. Ulytau, or Ortak, was the homeland of Oghuz Qaghan, his ancestors, and his descendants. This is what we shall narrate below. To do so, we turned to the pages of the “Oghuz-nāme,” the “Genealogy of the Turkmen,” and other sources for which we have no grounds for disbelief — especially since these works fairly fully reveal the possibilities for a coherent account of Oghuz history.

In our view, the historiographical milieu has buried the chronicles about Oghuz Qaghan too deeply, and in this book we pursue the goal of compensating for this unjust “silencing” in school textbooks of Oghuz’s role in reforming a powerful nomadic empire. The period of national history occupying the second half of the 1st millennium BCE introduces new nomadic groups on the steppe stage — such as the Kipchak, Kangly, Kalach, Uighur — yet again ignores the chronicle fact that the emergence of these ethnonyms and communities was directly influenced by Oghuz Qaghan’s policy.

The genealogical origin of Oghuz Qaghan is set out in detail in Rashid al-Din’s “Oghuz-nāme.” Abu’l-Ghazi largely repeats his narrative, adding only certain new names. According to these sources, Mugul had four sons: the eldest Kara Khan, the second Gur Khan, the third Kyr Khan, and the fourth Ur Khan. Following the tradition of his ancestors, Mugul Khan before his death transferred rule over his yurt to his eldest son Kara Khan, who continued to summer (zhailau) in the mountains of Ortak and Kertak (Ulytau and Kishitau), and spent winters at the mouth of the Syr River, in the Karakum and Barsuk sands.

Kara Khan’s senior wife gave birth to a son “more beautiful than the moon and the sun.” Medieval chroniclers emphasize the religious dimension of this event, appealing to the notion that from Japheth to Alynysh Khan the Turkic people were orthodox and adhered to spiritual paths transmitted from generation to generation from the prophets and from Nuh (Noah) himself.

Chronicles place Oghuz Qaghan’s lifetime differently. “Tatar narrators assign his existence to almost 2600 years before the Birth of Christ; Strahlenberg places it 600 years [before], while we, on the contrary — judging by the number of khans who lived from Oghuz to Chinggis and by other occurrences described with good precision by Abu’l-Ghazi and in the Bukhara manuscripts we have obtained — place it no more than 300 or 400 years before the Birth of Christ.

This view may be confirmed by the following circumstances from general history. When Oghuz invaded Persia, he subdued provinces such as Bukhara, Badakhshan, Khorasan, Shamakhi, Armenia, and others — that is, the same territories conquered by Alexander the Great. But as the ancient Assyrian and Persian histories present neither such names nor even invasions before Alexander, it follows that Oghuz entered these lands after him, and probably at the time when, after the division of Alexander’s monarchy among his commanders, the eastern part of Persia was left by the Greeks without attention or respect.” (Gaverdovsky, p. 152)

In light of the narrative based on Abu’l-Ghazi’s “Genealogy of the Turks,” we can only support Gaverdovsky’s position — especially since Alkey Margulan also gives a date close to it. He places Oghuz’s campaigns after the campaigns of Modu (209–174 BCE), that is, approximately in the 2nd century BCE. (Margulan, 2011, p. 127)

Yet under Alynysh, “the people acquired much wealth and livestock; they became intoxicated by riches and forgot God.” This was the period of the Early Iron Age, when seasonal pasture-based pastoralism became dominant among steppe dwellers, and at the same time metallurgy reached a high level of development. Ulyq-Baqyrlyq, or modern Zhezkazgan, became a major metallurgical center where rich surface layers provided ancient miners and metallurgists with copper, silver, and gold.

The mastery of iron and improvements in weaponry strengthened the nomadic empire. Total control over key trade-route directions gave the nomads access to the consolidation of gold reserves in their hands.

Gold became the embodiment of supreme power and an attribute of aristocratic distinction from the masses. The Qaghan’s entourage and local governors dressed in golden garments and even covered their horses in golden armor. Golden saddles and golden reins distinguished a person of authority from those around him. Such a noble nomad was buried with all his attire and his faithful horse, and a stone kurgan was raised above him.

The exaltation of certain individuals above the people and the cult of exceptional personalities led to a departure from the One God and to the spread of idolatry in the spiritual life of the steppe — an idolatry that became widespread and left a deep imprint in people’s consciousness. Traces of worship of “dolls” can be found in the reports of Plano Carpini, William of Rubruck, and Marco Polo, who testify that the Mongols embroidered dolls of their ancestors or deceased loved ones, placed them in yurts or carts, and worshiped them. That is, among some tribes idolatry either persisted for centuries or returned into everyday life from distant memory.

In the period under consideration, the situation around idolatry changed. This was accompanied by the birth of Oghuz. Chroniclers portray him as resembling Jesus, who spoke as an infant with the speech of an adult. A difference in Oghuz’s birth legend is that he spoke when he turned one. According to ancient Turkic tradition, a child was named only upon reaching the age of one. Until then, one had to observe the infant’s character and habits, and only afterward — thus determining his future — was an appropriate name bestowed.

When Oghuz turned one, his father Kara Khan convened a council for the occasion. But at this council Oghuz spoke with the voice of an adult and announced to all that his name was Oghuz and that he would be the future great ruler of all the people. Those present did not object; they liked the name Oghuz and decided to keep it for the prince.

Chroniclers associate Oghuz with a person granted special favor by the Almighty, who “even in the mother’s womb made Oghuz His beloved (bali).” The “Oghuz-nāme” and the “Genealogy of the Turks” say that Oghuz refused to nurse from his mother and secretly compelled her to become Muslim.

All this sets Oghuz Qaghan apart from the other steppe rulers listed in the sources. The religious ground became the cause of Oghuz’s conflict with his father Kara Khan. After defeating him, Oghuz Qaghan began his campaigns under the idea of fighting idolatry and spreading faith in the One God among peoples.

Oghuz Qaghan’s campaigns and the formation of the ancient Turkic tribes

We recount Oghuz Qaghan’s campaigns primarily from Abu’l-Ghazi, because his narrative — using geographical names listed in the work — is much clearer for the modern reader. Rashid al-Din’s “Oghuz-nāme” presents these campaigns more reliably, but his exposition requires many references and identifications.

Above, we noted that the historical significance of Oghuz Qaghan lies in the spread of monotheism and in the unification of China, Central Asia, and the Near East into a single empire whose political center became the Ulytau Mountains. And it began with Kara Khan’s son — whose mission was to eradicate idolatry among the people. Conflict between father and son was inevitable, for the meaning of Adam and Eve’s presence on Earth and that of their descendants lies in the perpetual struggle of those who believe in the One God against unbelievers.

The Early Iron Age was marked by the formation of social inequality, the cultivation and deification of supreme power, and increased centralization of material resources through the consolidation of households — made possible by the освоение steppe spaces by seasonal pasture-based pastoral economies. All this led to the enrichment of the nobility and their distancing from the covenant of the Prophet Nuh.

Against this backdrop, Oghuz’s birth inevitably became a detonator of conflict between the orthodox and idolaters. He was born at a time when enmity between these two parties was fierce: a father killed his son upon learning he was Muslim, and an idolatrous son killed his Muslim father.

When Oghuz grew up and married, his main condition for a bride was the acceptance of Islam; but she, fearing death, refused to take on such a “problem.” The same occurred with the second wife. Only the third wife agreed to become a believer.

Kara Khan, of course, did not know that his son was Muslim. He learned this only when Oghuz went hunting in distant vilayets of the country. Kara Khan was curious why his son rejected the first two brides but loved the third. When the first wives told the full truth to Oghuz’s father, Kara Khan convened an emergency council of his beks, and after discussion it was decided to seize Oghuz during the hunt and kill him.

Learning of this treacherous plan, Oghuz’s youngest wife secretly sent a trusted man to her husband and warned him of the danger. Receiving the message, Oghuz called to the whole people: “My father gathers an army to kill me; whoever holds to me, let him come to me; whoever holds to my father, let him join him.” (Sablukov, 1904, p. 15)

Surprisingly, not all supported Kara Khan. It turned out that many of his relatives and close associates had for many years been burdened by the duty of worshiping idols and had secretly preserved a genetic memory of the One God. Nevertheless, far more troops gathered on Kara Khan’s side than on Oghuz’s. Even so, a party formed that went with Oghuz, and he called them Uighur, deriving from the ancient Turkic word ұю (“clotted cream”), with the political meaning “ally” or “comrade-in-arms.”

According to Y. P. Gaverdovsky, the modern numerous Kazakh tribe of the Middle Zhuz, Argyn, originates from the Uighurs. [Gaverdovsky’s long enumeration of tribal origins follows in the original.]

After Oghuz Khan’s campaigns and the expansion of his domains, the lands where the Uighurs localized corresponded to those listed by Gaverdovsky. In Chinese sources of the end of the 1st millennium BCE, the Uighur Khaganate already appears as an independent state and maintains direct trade relations with China. The modern Uighurs of Eastern Turkestan (Xinjiang/Uyghur Autonomous Region) preserved the original ethnonym, while the origin of the ethnonym Argyn has several competing versions.

But let us return to our narrative of Oghuz… Despite the numerical superiority of Kara Khan’s army, the Lord of Worlds was on Oghuz’s side. Kara Khan fled and soon died from a head wound inflicted by an arrow. Oghuz was elected qaghan and sat upon his father’s golden throne. From this moment begins the modernization of the entire political structure of the state, based on new socio-political relations. Idolatry is eradicated and monotheism spreads throughout the lands.

Henceforth, state governance began to operate on the principle of supporting and patronizing those who became Muslims; conversely, those who inertly continued idolatry were subjected to repression: “he put the fathers to death and made their children slaves.” (Sablukov, p. 16)

Across the vast domains of Kara Khan’s former state, not all influential regional rulers accepted the rules of the new vertical of power. Therefore, Oghuz Qaghan organized campaigns against such opponents every year and always emerged victorious. Deposed ulus rulers fled to the Tatars, who by that time lived in Northern China and modern Mongolia.

This strengthening of the Tatars created an unfavorable trend for Oghuz Qaghan, so he launched a campaign against the Tatar khan, defeated him, and annihilated his entire army, despite the fact that both the munguls and the Tatars were of the same “lineage.” Thus, all nomadic tribes inhabiting the territories of modern Kazakhstan and Mongolia were united.

In that campaign Oghuz Qaghan gained so much material wealth that it was impossible to pack it all onto horses. To solve this, a man in the army fashioned an arba (cart), and following his model others made similar carts. The squeak of the cart wheels produced the irritating sound “kanq-kanq,” and the tipsy warriors jokingly nicknamed the man who made the first cart Qangly, and all his descendants received this ethnonym.

In this episode we witness the legendary origin of the Qangly tribe and the invention of the cart, although nomadic chariots are attested earlier in Bronze Age petroglyphs and have a more ancient origin. Nevertheless, the time of the Qangly’s formation corresponds to the time indicated in historiography.

After subjugating the Tatars, Oghuz Qaghan conquered China, Shurshit (Jurchen), as well as Tangut (Tibet) and Kara-Khitai. During these campaigns, a new clan, the Kipchak, emerged. When great rulers went on campaign, according to ancient Turkic tradition they took one wife with them. One of Oghuz’s close nukers also took his wife, who became pregnant. The nuker died in battle, and when the time came to give birth, his wife could find no shelter: the conditions were those of a military march, and there was nowhere to hide from the cold. Then she found a hollow in a tree and, taking refuge there, gave birth to a son, whom Oghuz Qaghan named Kipchak (kab — tree bark; shak — to split), meaning “hollow tree.”

Oghuz Qaghan took the child into his household to raise him. When Kipchak grew up, Oghuz entrusted him with subjugating the peoples Uрус, Alan, Magyar, Bashkurt living west of the imperial domains — peoples long struggling to preserve autonomy. Having completed eastern conquests, Oghuz Qaghan gave Kipchak many troops with experienced, battle-hardened nukers leading the дружины and sent him on a western campaign. Kipchak subdued all the peoples from Itil (the Volga) to the Don and ruled there for many years. The entire population living there from the time of Oghuz Qaghan to Chinggis Qaghan was called Kipchak, or Dasht-i Kipchak (“the stony Kipchak”).

Having strengthened his army with the Tatars and other peoples who had joined him, Oghuz Qaghan launched a campaign against Turan and India. After breaking the resistance of Tashkent, Samarkand, and Bukhara, he himself laid siege to Sayram and Tashkent, while sending his sons to Turkestan and Andijan. After that, Oghuz’s forces advanced on Balkh, and then into the region of Ghur.

In the mountains of Ghur heavy snow fell, and the army refused to go any farther; but Oghuz Qaghan, despite everything, ordered them onward. In this way he succeeded in taking Ghur. When spring came and the time arrived to count the troops for the new year, it turned out that several commanders with their retinues were missing. A few days later they arrived and reported that, while crossing the mountains, a fierce snowfall had begun and a blizzard struck; all their horses died, they fell behind the main force, and then caught up on foot. Then Oghuz Qaghan declared: “Let these people be called Qarluq,” that is, “the snowy ones.” Thus a new Turkic tribe, the Qarluq, came into being.

Setting out from Ghur, Oghuz Qaghan took Kabul and Ghazni and marched on Kashmir. The ruler of Kashmir at that time was Yaghma, who, relying on the inaccessibility of his domains, chose to resist. Over an entire year of siege, many troops fell on both sides before Kashmir was taken. Yaghma was executed, and Oghuz Qaghan moved his army back to Mungulia (Ulytau) through Badakhshan and Samarkand.

After giving the army a year of rest, Oghuz ordered preparations for a many-year campaign into Persia. The next year he brought his forces out of the Karakum and Barsuk sands, moved up the course of the Syr Darya, and arrived at the city of Telash. At that time the tribe called Kalash arose; after these campaigns they multiplied and settled the lands of Mawarannahr, Khorasan, and Iraq. The ethnonym Kalash means “remain hungry.” (Sablukov, p. 20)

Passing through Samarkand and Bukhara, Oghuz Qaghan’s troops entered the lands of Khorasan. At that moment, after the death of the single ruler — the Persian king Keyumars — the Iranian (Ariyan) yurt was experiencing fragmentation. Keyumars, after the campaigns of Iskandar (Alexander) of Macedon and the internecine struggles following Alexander’s death, had managed to unite the yurt under a single authority. But after Keyumars’s death, a struggle for power began; it ended without result and significantly weakened Persia.

Having taken Khorasan, Oghuz Qaghan seized Iraq-i Ajam, Iraq-i Arab, Azerbaijan, Armenia, Syria, and Egypt. In taking these lands he used a policy of negotiated reconciliation; yet when certain rulers resisted, he applied the full force of arms and punished the defeated without mercy. This tactic was later employed by Chinggis Qaghan in the 13th century.

After installing his own people across all the conquered lands from Sayram to Egypt, Oghuz Qaghan returned to his native yurt. Gaverdovsky writes of this: “Oghuz, already near the end of his days, after forty years away from his homeland, returned with great spoils again to the steppe to live, as before, in his shepherds’ huts — something very rarely seen among conquerors.” Arriving home, in the steppe expanses from the Barsuks to the Ortak mountains, he held a great toi (feast) in honor of his successful campaigns and the completion of a deed pleasing to the Almighty. “For this he ordered a palace to be built, the ends of all the trees to be overlaid with gold, and to adorn them with rubies, hyacinths, emeralds, turquoise, and pearls.” (Sablukov, p. 22)

At this toi, Oghuz Qaghan ordered 900 horses and 9,000 sheep to be slaughtered. He also ordered 99 vessels to be made of saffian leather, nine of them to be filled with wine and ninety with kumys. In accordance with the merits achieved during the campaigns, Oghuz Qaghan distributed cities, regions, and settlements among his nökers. Thus, approximately in the 2nd century BCE, here in Ulytau, Oghuz Qaghan formed a territorial-administrative division of his vast empire among his six sons.

Moreover, according to Gaverdovsky, he divided the nomadic peoples into nine hordes and assigned them under his sons’ authority:

“The first horde was called Uighur… it constituted properly the Mongol lineage and spread within the Kirghiz Steppe around the Ishim and Turgai rivers.

The second, Naiman, settled near Turkestan, and later moved east beyond the Altai Mountains.

The third, Kipchak… moved to the western part of the Kirghiz Steppe, occupying the Ilek and Ural rivers and spreading even to the Volga.

The fourth, Qangly, or Katkyn, roamed by the present-day Dzungarian mountains.

The fifth, Qall-ach, scattered across the land of Mawarannahr.

The sixth, Qarluq (or Qurla), the seventh, Eur (or Ur-mankash), the eighth, Salchzhaut, and the ninth, Jelaut, all spread east of the Altai Mountains as far as the borders of China and to its north.”

According to Oghuz Qaghan’s precepts, authority over the nine nomadic hordes and the conquered lands could be exercised only by his descendants. This dynastic rule in the Ulytau region persisted up to the migration of the Oghuz tribes into the lands of present-day Turkmenistan. Thus, along the entire Silk Road a centralized administration was created, which stabilized political life and led to the growth of trade relations among the regions.

Oghuz Qaghan was among those rulers who, at the dawn of their fame, returned to their homeland and lived out old age as a simple shepherd in their native steppe, migrating with their yurts across promised lands. In our case, Oghuz Qaghan spent his final years in our Ulytau region and, most likely, was buried here.

Kün Khan. In Chapter I of our book, when mentioning the historical figures Tatar and Mugul, we noted that, according to the sources, Mugul’s homeland was Ulytau. The question of whether Tatar and Mugul were the names of specific individuals or — as Gawerdowski once remarked about the munguls — a “state of mind” or a collective designation of nomads, has always arisen and will continue to arise when dealing with medieval genealogical chronicles.

In this matter we can only assume that newly emerging nomadic states used, as an ideological driving force and as confirmation of their right to the throne within a new social union, the name of a renowned and “great” ancestor in genealogy. There are many such examples: the Oghuz, the Turks, the Muguls, the Khazars, the Karakhanids, the Rus’, the Uzbeks, the Nogais.

Kün Khan was the eldest son of Oghuz Qaghan and headed the wing of Bozok — “the broken bow.” According to the legend recorded by the chroniclers, Oghuz Qaghan distributed state administration among his sons while still on campaign in Syria. Thus, he established the order of governing a vast empire and the dynastic continuation of supreme power.

It happened as follows. While in Syria, Oghuz Qaghan instructed one of his nökers to hide a golden bow and three golden arrows. He ordered: “Bury the bow in the earth in the steppe where the sun rises, in a place where no human foot has trodden; leave one end protruding from the ground. Take the arrows to the side where the sun sets, and hide them as you hid the bow.” A year later he summoned his three elder sons — Kün, Ay, and Yulduz — and, citing pressing affairs, sent them to hunt on the eastern side of the land, where, in his view, game would be plentiful.

Having sent the elder sons away, he summoned the three younger ones — Kök, Tag, and Tengiz — and sent them to hunt in the west. The elder brothers found the bow, broke it into three parts, and brought it, together with rich hunting trophies, to the Qaghan. The younger brothers found the three golden arrows and, dividing them among themselves, returned and likewise presented them to their father. In this way Oghuz Qaghan divided his empire into two wings: the right wing — Bozok (“broken bow”), and the left wing — Üçok (“three arrows”).

After the death of Oghuz Qaghan, by his testament, the throne passed to his eldest son, Kün Khan. His atalyk was Irqyl Khoja, ruler of Yenkent — a city built by Oghuz Qaghan. With Kün Khan’s accession, the empire faced the danger of internecine conflict and separatism, since each of the six sons of Oghuz Qaghan had four sons of his own.

Understanding the potential for self-separation under Kün Khan’s rule — given that each regional ruler possessed immense treasures, countless herds, and rapidly growing cities with subject populations — Irqyl Khoja proposed a solution: to determine for each prince his rank and powers, and to assign each of them tamgas and ongons. This is described in detail both by Rashid al-Din and by Abu’l-Ghazi.

When distributing seats and powers among his younger brothers and his sons, Kün Khan regulated their settlement by regions, their right to choose particular portions of mutton and horse meat at gatherings and feasts, and the honor of carving the meat — down to specifying whose duty it was to hold the horses at the entrance of the yurt.

In the first yurt on the right hand of Kün Khan’s tent sat Qayı, his eldest son. “He was given the right hind shank (of the ram — author); Bayat (Kün Khan’s second son) carved it; Sarky (a son of Oghuz Qaghan by a concubine) held the horses.” (Kononov, p. 51). Among those who held the horses were also the Kangly, Kalash, Kipchak, Karluk, and others — whose status was placed on a par with that of Oghuz Qaghan’s sons born of concubines.

In total, Kün Khan seated the twenty-four grandsons of Oghuz Qaghan in twelve yurts, two per yurt, and divided the empire into twelve böleks. The descendants of these böleks came to be called yüzlik. In this manner Kün Khan divided society into a special estate consisting of representatives of Oghuz Qaghan’s dynasty and the common people — khalq.

At the same time, during the period of his foreign campaigns, Oghuz Qaghan had bestowed names on the warriors who accompanied him — such as Uyghur, Kipchak, Kalash, Kangly, Karluk. Together with the sons born to the Qaghan from concubines, they also numbered twenty-four. All of them occupied privileged places near the yurts: twelve held the horses and twelve sat by the door. Their descendants were called aymak (district/region).

Thus, at this Kurultai held in Ulytau, Kün Khan divided the empire of Oghuz Qaghan into twelve yüzliks and twenty-four aymaks. The political center of the state became the wintering grounds in the sands of the Karaqum and the Barsuks, and the summer pastures in the mountains of Ortaq (Ulytau) and Kertaq (Kishitau). The twenty-four aymaks were subordinate to the twelve yüzliks and functioned on the basis of a new fiscal-administrative system.

For the tribes of Bozok, which formed the right wing of the army, the jaylau were allocated as “summer pastures [in the lands] from the borders of Sayram and the mountains of Bashgurd to Karabagh. For the Üçok tribes, which formed the left wing, summer pastures were allocated [in the lands] from Kurtak, Yerud, Tug-luk and Bozyak to Aqzaq Almalyk.

The winterings (qışlaq) for the right (Bozok) wing were determined in Barsuk, Aktak, Namalmysh and Basarqum. For the left (Üçok) wing they were determined in Qayı-dere, Asanash, Qum Sengri, Qayı Durdu and Yar Sengri.”

Translators of the “Oghuz-name” were unable to fully identify these ancient toponyms with modern names. Yet, given the locations of Sayram, Bashgurd and Barsuks, it may be assumed that the two wings were separated across the steppe along the Sarysu River: the Bozoks received the right to roam the western part, and the Üçoks the eastern.

At this same Kurultai, Kün Khan established the main legal norms of the state. The first and foremost norm was unconditional compliance with the accepted order of eating. The second: for a committed crime, responsibility was assigned regardless of origin or privilege. If representatives of the khan arrived to carry out punishment for a crime, no one had the right to hinder the investigation or execution of the sentence; the offender was to be brought to the khan’s court and “with a sword-blow across the back, cleave him in two, so that those who can see — see, and those who can hear — hear.” (Kononov, p. 54).

The third legal norm determined the procedure for electing the head of state. He was to be chosen only from Oghuz’s descendants and only from the Bozok — i.e., from the descendants of the elder sons, Kün, Ay and Yulduz. It was forbidden to enthrone two qaghans. This was fraught with internecine conflict among the princes of one qaghan in the event of the other’s death, for “two swords do not fit in one scabbard, two men cannot take one wife, and in one yurt there is no place for two rulers (töre).” (Kononov, p. 54).

All these covenants (ahdname) adopted at the Kurultai were written on a large sheet of paper. This detail suggests that already in the 2nd century BCE writing existed. Most likely it was ancient Turkic runic (tamga-like) writing, evidence of which we find on the bottom of a silver bowl discovered in the Issyk kurgan in 1969 by Beken Nurmukhanbetov as part of the archaeological expedition of Kemal Akishev.

Kün Khan, his younger brothers, his sons, the beks, the best of the elders and the bravest warriors wrote their names in the Covenant (Ahdname), affixed their seals, and placed the charter in Kün Khan’s treasury. By signing, they swore they would not deviate from the decisions adopted at the Kurultai and bequeathed to posterity to “heed this covenant and act in accordance with it until the end of the world.” (Kononov, p. 54).

Thus, approximately in the 3rd–2nd centuries BCE, or after the campaigns of Alexander the Great, a large nomadic empire took shape in the Ulytau region, bringing order to relations among many peoples across vast expanses of Eurasia. In this period the Great Silk Road began to function vigorously, and for the first time Chinese sources testify to the establishment of interstate trade between China and the Uyghurs. Control of trade routes, the replenishment of the state treasury through annual tribute from across the empire, the development of metallurgy and the growth of livestock numbers turned the nomads into holders of strong power. This power, in turn, demanded reinforcement through new campaigns against those who rebelled and refused to pay taxes.

After the death of Kün Khan, the throne was raised to his eldest son Qayı, who became the progenitor of the Oghuz dynasty that in the 11th century migrated to Asia Minor. In the 10th–11th centuries, all adherents of this authority came to be called the people of Qayı. The ethnonym was preserved by the modern Turks, who under Seljuk Pasha moved from Central Asia to Anatolia. The Qayı in Turkey also preserved a tamga identical to that of the Baghanaly — IYI — which most likely combines the tamga Y of Chepni (bahadur) or Sheni (hero), the fourth son of Kök Khan, and the tamga // of Qarkyn (hospitable), the fourth son of Yulduz Khan. On Osman Bey’s banner, the ongon of a falcon (aksunqar) was also depicted — an ongon likewise preserved among the Baghanaly.

Self-regulation of inter-clan relations proceeded on the basis of the assigned rank of each clan, its rulers, its geographical location and the duties fixed as its contribution to preserving the integrity of the state and strengthening its might.

The question of distributing tamgas at different stages of history remains an актуal theme for tracing the periodization of the formation of tribes and ethnic unions. The attribution of tamgas to a particular clan or tribe helps explain the ethnogenesis of these related patriarchal groups. The meaning of a tamga reflects the geographical and socio-political features of each ethnos. The tamga determines the right to private ownership of the steppe person’s principal wealth — livestock — as well as the right to use pasturelands where seasonal migration routes were formed over millennia. Tamgas carved on gravestones — especially in cemeteries located on summer pastures — serve as seals testifying to hereditary rights to these lands.

The absence of people on summer pastures in winter made jaylau vulnerable to challenges of ownership. Therefore, clan cemeteries were generally located on summer pastures. Officers of the Russian General Staff in 1862 left testimonies about the spread among Kazakhs of temporary burials — amanat. The deceased was sewn into camel hide, suspended with poles on a height or placed on the roof of a shoshal, and with the arrival of spring, together with the migration, the sewn body was transported to the summer pastures, where burial took place.

Tamgas, urans and ongons played an enormous role in the life of Turkic peoples: they regulated military formation, identified genealogical origin, legitimized property, and integrated land use into a single system. The fact that today there are virtually no states without national symbols can be explained by the reality that nomads — first in the person of the Saka, and later the Huns — spread the practice of state identification marks in the form of tamgas across the entire Eurasian space, and the adoption of distinctive symbols became a generally accepted tradition among many polities.

The study of clan and tribal tamgas provides substantial assistance in reconstructing a people’s history. Such scholars as A. Levshin, Ch. Valikhanov, L. Meyer, A. Kharuzin, N. Aristov, M. Gordekov, M. Tynyshpaev, S. Amanzholov and others undertook efforts to decipher the meanings of various tamgas. In the course of searching for the origins of tamgas, different viewpoints emerged in scholarship.

To the question of when in human history the first tamgas appeared, each researcher offers his own opinion. V. Radlov believed that among Turkic peoples tamgas began to be used from the time of Oghuz Qaghan’s son Kün Khan, which is confirmed in the “Oghuz-name.” Modern researchers likewise point to this.

The study of rock inscriptions and clan signs at the Tamgaly-tas (Tanbaly Nura) tract confirms that the earliest tamgas belong to the Oghuz period. This complex of rock tamgas is connected with one of the most important events in Kazakhstan’s history — the unification of Kazakh tribes to create a single statehood. “In memory of this, they would carve their clan tamgas on the cliff. This cliff, called Tamgaly-tas (Tanbaly Nura — author), Kazakhs would attribute to the Ulytau area. And the very name of the locality, Tamgaly-tas — Kendyrlyk, speaks of the site’s connection to Ulytau.” (A. Margulan, 2011).

Tanbaly Nura is a valuable and sacred monument not only for Kazakhs but for the entire Turkic world. In search of this complex, in the 1990s the Zhezkazgan State Archive organized an expedition that conducted a visual survey of the monument. By that time the site had sunk deeply into the ground and required archaeological work.

Tanbaly Nura is located 60 km south of the Moyynkum sands, 20 km east of the left bank of the Sarysu River, on the territory of South Kazakhstan Region. The monument is protected by harsh natural conditions, yet according to some reports it suffered industrial vandalism in Soviet times due to quarrying.

The petroglyphs depict tamgas of various eras, from the Bronze Age to the Kazakh Khanate period. All signs were applied to the rock in order to leave a trace in history and to pass on to subsequent generations an example of unity in the face of future dangers.

The area of the rock, located in a gorge about 47 meters deep, is 6 m². According to the 1890 research of the Omsk topographer Yu. A. Shmidt, 445 tribal and clan tamgas were carved on the rock. The first references to Tamgaly Nura appear in the works of Mashhur Zhusip. Targeted research at the complex was conducted in 1840 by A. I. Shrenk and the military doctor L. O. Kuznetsov; in 1895 by the interpreter of Atbasar district Asankozha Bekkhozhin; in 1928 by the chief geologist of the Karsakbay copper-smelting combine K. I. Satpayev; and in 1950 by the Central Kazakhstan Archaeological Expedition led by A. Kh. Margulan.

Tanbaly Nura is an “engraved Constitution” of the entire Turkic world and awaits research and restoration so that the monument may be presented to the public.

The main concentration of Oghuz-period tamgas at Tanbaly Nura should be attributed to the middle of the 11th century. It was then that dynastic governance in the steppe changed, and only the Baghanaly and the Niruun preserved in Ulytau the hereditary right to the throne. But we will set this out in more detail below; for now, we will not depart further from the topic of tamgas.

Until the 11th century, our region is обозначed in chronicle sources and in the works of geographers as “Mufazat al-Ghuzz”, meaning “the Steppe of the Ghuzz (Oghuz).” From the Oghuz period up to the beginning of the 20th century, a tamga (clan-mark) continuity can be traced between the ancient tribes of Oghuz Qaghan’s empire and the modern Baghanaly. The two principal tamgas — the “bakan” (Y) and the “aksunkar” (…) — have remained in use among local clans for more than two thousand years. The same tamgas are also found among Turkmen tamgas, which confirms the migration of the main part of the Oghuz tribes to the territory of present-day Turkmenistan, and later to Asia Minor.

There is also a composite tamga combining the “bakan” and the “qarkyn” — IYI. It is not found in Kazakhstan, but it has been preserved by the descendants of the Qayı, who migrated to Asia Minor under Seljuk. This tamga, together with the ongon “aksunkar” (the saker falcon), became part of the symbolism of the new Turkish state founded by Osman Bey.

The Baghanaly tamga Y and the ongon (…) trace their origin back to the time when they were distributed by Kün Khan among the grandsons of Oghuz Qaghan. The continuity of tamgas is also evident among the Torgai Kipchaks, who preserved the “qarkyn” sign — //.

The genealogy of the rulers of Oghuz’s realm is set out in the “Oghuz-name” and in the “Genealogy of the Turkmen” (Kononov’s translation), which narrate the entire sequence of rulers from Qayı to the padishah Toghrul, who, according to Rashid al-Din, “was padishah for twenty years up to the very prophethood of our Prophet (Muhammad), may Allah bless him and grant him peace!”

Thus, we may date the events reflected in the chronicles from the 3rd century BCE to the beginning of the 7th century CE. Yet these chronicles describe events directly connected with Ulytau and the Syr Darya, while at the same time, in the broader perspective of historical processes, they draw us toward the histories of Turkmenistan, Khiva, and the Ottoman Empire. Therefore, in order to define the autochthonous character of Ulytau’s history, it is expedient to turn to the “Genealogical Tree of the Turks” by the Khivan khan Abu’l-Ghazi, in the translation (with a foreword) by G. S. Sablukov. This translation was completed in 1854, and the work was published in Kazan, at the printing house of the Imperial University, in 1905.

Sablukov’s version leads us from Oghuz Qaghan to Dobyn Bayan (or Dobyn Mergen), whom Alkey Margulan identifies with the famous ancestor of the Kiyat clan, Dombaul, whose “wild-stone,” yurt-shaped mausoleum stands on the left bank of the Kendirlik (Kengir) River. We will discuss this in order below.

According to Abu’l-Ghazi in Sablukov’s translation, before departing to the “Merciful God,” Kün Khan raised his brother Ay Khan to the throne. Under him, the state lived according to the adopted covenant and adhered to the priority of development established by their father, Oghuz Qaghan. After Ay Khan, Yulduz Khan stood at the head of the empire. Abu’l-Ghazi asserts that this was not Ay Khan’s younger brother, but his grandson or a half-brother. Nevertheless, he came from the line of Oghuz Qaghan, and the time of Yulduz Khan’s rule may be dated immediately after Ay Khan. What is certain is that further succession passed from Ay Khan, not from Yulduz Khan — the third son of Oghuz Qaghan — who by that time, like Ay Khan himself, was of advanced age and could no longer bear the burden of ruling the vast empire.

Before his death, Yulduz Khan appointed his son Mengli to the throne — also a worthy ruler who lived an energetic life, resolving the day-to-day affairs of state. After him, his son Tengiz Khan ascended the throne; he reigned for many years and, having grown old, appointed his son El Khan as heir.

El Khan was a strong sovereign of the Mungul people and remained in history as a ruler who led wars against the Tatars. At that time, the Tatar realm was headed by Suyinshi Khan. Constant warfare and mutual destruction weakened the once-unified empire. Moreover, Suyinshi Khan entered into an alliance with the Kyrgyz and persuaded them to wage a joint war against the Munguls. In the end, the previously invincible Munguls suffered a severe defeat; the Tatars plundered their auls and exterminated the entire population.

Only El Khan’s son Kiyan and the son of El Khan’s younger brother, Nukuz, survived. They escaped from Tatar captivity, managed to drive off part of their livestock, and began to search for a place where their enemies could not find them until they regained strength. Thus their fate brought them to a place they would call Ergenekon (“a carefree encampment”).

Ergenekon. The location of the sacred Ergenekon is a subject of search and debate among modern scholars. At one time, Alkey Margulan argued that Ergenekon was most likely situated in the Altai Mountains. Today, researchers such as Kairat Zakiryanov and Kairat Zaripbay confidently locate Ergenekon in the mountain valleys of Fergana. These interpretations undoubtedly have a right to exist and arise from a literal reading of Abu’l-Ghazi’s description of the mountain gorge in which our heroes took refuge.

In the chronicle, it is a mountainous area where the fugitives made their way along a single path worn by wild mountain sheep; and when they saw a gorge into which there was no other road except the one by which they had come, they decided to stop there.

Abu’l-Ghazi’s poetic characterization of Ergenekon was formed on the basis of accounts from “the best Chinggisids from all over the world” and from the books which, as he claims, he had in his hands — “eighteen” of them. Therefore, whatever mountain range is proposed, the search for the true geographical location of Ergenekon will remain a matter of constant discussion. Only one assertion may be added to this debate: Ulytau, too, may be Ergenekon, because it was the homeland of Kiyan and Nukuz, not a foreign land. Outside Ergenekon lay the vast expanses that had formerly belonged to the Mungul yurts. (Sablukov, p. 30).

Nevertheless, Ergenekon became a благодатное (blessed, providential) place for the salvation of the line of Oghuz — the dynasty of the great rulers of the steppe. We can tentatively date the tragedy of the Mungul people and Kiyan’s and Nukuz’s settlement of Ergenekon to approximately the 2nd century CE. Their descendants multiplied: “their palm widened, their sides broadened; each family became a separate aymak and bore the name of its progenitor.” (Sablukov, p. 30).

According to Abu’l-Ghazi, the people of Kiyan (the Kiyats, in the plural) lived in Ergenekon for more than four hundred years, and, having grown in number, began to experience hardship because of the теснота (lack of space). The question of such a long period of isolation can be explained by the tragic events that unfolded during the 3rd–4th centuries as a result of a two-century drought that gripped the entire steppe.

This was the longest drought recorded by medieval sources. L. N. Gumilev explains the усиление аридности (intensification of aridity) in the steppe by a shift of Atlantic cyclones into the Volga River basin, away from the basins of the Amu Darya, Syr Darya, and Semirechye. When precipitation moves toward the Volga region and Siberia, the Aral and Balkhash are deprived of inflow; moisture in the steppe becomes scarce; reaches and springs disappear — not to mention the spring floods of mountain rivers. And so it continues for one, or, in the case under discussion, two centuries.

The periodicity of recorded droughts is characterized by a cyclicity of roughly six centuries. Historical cataclysms — accompanied by the disappearance of major empires and the emergence of new dynasties and states — occurred in the 2nd century BCE, in the 2nd–4th centuries CE, and in the 10th and 16th centuries.

The two-century drought of the 3rd–4th centuries led to the Great Migration of Peoples, and the detonator of these events were the Huns. From time to time, migration out of the Kazakh steppe proceeded along the northern shore of the Caspian Sea, when its boundaries extended eastward beyond the Aral Sea; in those periods, the passage into Persia was blocked.

The onset of drought occurs because Atlantic precipitation shifts northward into the Volga basin. The rains overflow the Caspian and expand it, filling and even overfilling the Aral. After that, due to evaporation and the subsequent southward movement of Atlantic cyclones, precipitation increases in the Tian Shan, Pamir, and Alatau. Thus fertility returns to the steppe and a new cycle begins in the life of the nomads. Livestock numbers increase, and consequently so do human numbers; new confederations of tribes emerge, and later empires. Empires form when the shores of the combined Caspian and Aral retreat westward and open the route from the steppe into Persia. This is how the conquering campaigns of the kagans Oghuz and Chinggis took place.

Traces of Hunnic culture found in Mongolia and Semirechye, by contrast, are not observed in Ulytau at all. This fact argues for the isolation of the Ulytau Mountains from Hunnic influence. The only road into Ulytau was the Sarysu River, which most likely dried up — like all the other mountain rivers around the Ulytau range — thereby cutting the region off from the outside world by an impassable desert steppe. In those times, around Ulytau, within a radius of 300–400 km, there was a пустынная даль (desert vastness) without springs or reaches — something Abu’l-Ghazi likely had in mind. Meanwhile, the Altai and the southern mountain chains were the center of events, for there the struggle was for every patch of land.

It is not accidental that all the surviving mausolea of Ulytau — such as Ayakkamyr, Alasha Khan, Jochi Khan, Bolgan Ana, and Kulan Ana — share a distinctive symbolism on the portal: a Π-shaped recess, which represents a gate into the sacred Ergenekon.

Ergenekon became a symbol of the rebirth of the Oghuz: a place where the descendants of the ruling dynasty managed to survive and preserve their historical continuity. The memory of Ergenekon is captured in the architectural monuments of the Chinggisids, who in this way conveyed to us information about the important events of distant times. The خروج (departure) of the descendants of Oghuz Qaghan from Ergenekon falls on the time when the Iron Age gave way to the Middle Ages; therefore, we will continue our narrative in the next chapter.

Chapter IV. Ulytau in the Early Middle Ages

The question of the Mungul people’s exit from Ergenekon is also a matter of debate. It can be interpreted in favor of Soviet historiography, which claimed that the people who emerged from the Altai Ergenekon populated what is now Mongolia, and that Temüjin’s rise to the political summit began there.

We, however, incline toward the version of Abu’l-Ghazi, who writes that “after four hundred and fifty years the Munguls avenged their blood and their property and began to live in the yurt of their ancestors.” And the ancestral yurt of the Munguls, as we noted above, according to Rashid al-Din, was the Barsuks and the Karakums, as well as Ortak and Kertak. Thus, we have a weighty source-based assertion that the Munguls — having no relation whatsoever to the modern Mongols — under the leadership of Börte-Chino entered into prolonged battles with the Tatar tribes and, “having returned from Ergene-kon, struck the Tatars and, having occupied their fathers’ lands, began to rule in all the Tatar regions.” (Sablukov, p. 31).

Given that the Munguls’ paternal lands were Saryarka, the Syr Darya, and Issyk-Kul, we unambiguously lean toward the rise of Genghis Khan’s ancestors precisely in the “Kirgiz Steppe.” We will write about this below, but first we will pause on the revival of the Oghuz state, whose political center once again becomes the mountains of Ortak and Kertak.

If we assume that the entry into Ergenekon under Khan Kiyan occurred in the 2nd century, then, having lived there for 450 years, the Munguls emerged from it under Börte-Chino in the middle of the 6th century, i.e., during the formation of the Turkic Khaganate. According to the chronicles used by Abu’l-Ghazi, from Börte-Chino to Dobyn-bayan there lived 13 generations of rulers of the el. Let us list them: Börte-Chino — Koymeril — Beshin-kiyan (in “The Secret Genealogy of the Mongols”) — Botshagan — Timash (Tamasha) — Kyshy-mergen (Korshar-mergen) — Kozhyn-buryl (Uzhym-buryl) — Bokebendun — Samsaushy — Kalmashy — Temirtash — Menlikhoja — Zhuldyz — his two sons, from one of whom descended Dobyn-bayan.

All of the above-mentioned chronicle figures are objects of “division” between contemporary researchers of Mongolia and Kazakhstan. Mongolists, naturally, have “patented” their location on the banks of the Kerulen River, while Kazakh historians place the Munguls in Semirechye, Bukhtarma, and Chingiztau. We, for our part, as stated above, boldly localize them on the banks of Kendirli and associate them with participation in the formation and development of the Oghuz Khaganate.

According to official historiography, in the 5th–7th centuries the middle course of the Syr Darya and the Ulytau steppes were inhabited by the tribal unions of the Kangar-Pechenegs, who were displaced by the Oghuz. The Oghuz came from the east and in the 8th century settled in Western Saryarka, and later expanded their possessions to include the territories of Western Kazakhstan.

If we assume that Abu’l-Ghazi refers to the Kangar-Pecheneg tribes as “Tatars,” then the Oghuz can confidently claim the role of Genghis Khan’s ancestors. We will lay out the transformation of this process below when narrating the story of Dombaul; but for now, let us consider the process of building a major Oghuz state.

With the retreat of the great two-century drought and the return of Atlantic cyclones to the basins of rivers flowing into the Aral Sea and Balkhash, precipitation increases in Kazakhstan, and an even greater abundance occurs in Mongolia. In both spaces of the Eurasian part of the Earth’s arid zone, humidity increases, precipitation volume rises, grass cover becomes denser, and the abundance of water leads to an increase in the number of springs and river reaches.

In the middle of the 6th century, demographic growth in the steppe led to the formation of a centralized Turkic state. Abu’l-Ghazi names the main Turkic tribes as the Kipchaks, Kalash, Kankly, Uyghurs, and Karluks. Political events in the Turkic Khaganate took place in Eastern Kazakhstan, Mongolia, and Eastern Turkestan. Therefore, we will not move away from the Ulytau region and will return to the Oghuz Khaganate.

In A. N. Kononov’s translation, Abu’l-Ghazi lists the rulers of the Oghuz along the line of Kayi, the son of Kun Khan. Kayi had many sons, but already during Kun Khan’s lifetime, among the grandsons from Kayi he singled out Dib-Bakuy Khan, and therefore the people unanimously elected him as their khan. In “The Genealogy of the Turkmen,” there is no mention of Ergenekon, and events are described up to the expulsion of the Oghuz from “Issyk-Kul, Almalyk, Sayram, the mountains of Ulug-tag and Kichik-tag, and the mouth of the Syr River.” They were expelled by the Khitays, the Kankly, and the Naimans.

These events fall precisely in the 3rd–4th centuries, when drought gripped the steppe. Let us list all rulers from Dib-Bakuy Khan to the expulsion of the Oghuz into the Syr Darya, Mawarannahr, and modern Turkmenistan. Dib-Bakuy Khan died on a hunt, and his son Kuzy-Yavy was chosen as heir to the throne. The next ruler mentioned is Inal Khan, under whom the chief vizier was Korkyt-ata from the Kayi people. How many years passed between Kuzy-Yavy’s activity and the time of Inal Khan’s building efforts is unknown, but according to Kononov’s calculations, the events took place at the beginning of the 8th century.

At that time, “to the east the yurt of the Oghuz el extended to Issyk-Kul and Almalyk; to the south — to Sayram and the mountains of Kazykurt-tag and Karadzhyk-tag; to the north — to the mountains of Ulug-tag and Kichik-tag, where copper is mined; to the west — to Yangikent at the mouth of the Syr River, and to the Karakums.” In Abu’l-Ghazi’s opinion, these territories had been the ancestral lands of the Oghuz for 4–5 thousand years. The chronicler’s chronological framework is disputable, since it tends toward a biblical mode of counting years.

Nevertheless, with the onset of drought, internecine conflicts arose in the Oghuz environment: many els began to feud with one another due to a shortage of pasturelands. That was what the Khitays, Kankly, and Naimans exploited, driving out the Oghuz. And in the second half of the 6th century, the Ulytau pastures were mastered by the descendants of Oghuz, the Kiyats under Börte-Chino, who rebuilt statehood anew on their ancestral lands. The material evidence of the achievements of the Oghuz state are the fortress-cities, which will be discussed below.

The development of medieval urban culture in Western Saryarka proceeded in stages. Alkey Margulan distinguishes four periods of the development of architecture and construction in Kazakhstan: the early medieval period (6th–9th centuries), the high medieval period (10th–12th centuries), the Mongol period (13th–14th centuries), and the late medieval period (15th–18th centuries).

In the foothills of Ulytau, the ruins of palaces, castles, and unfortified “headquarters-ordas” of the medieval political elite have survived. The sedentary wintering sites of the zhataks represent a later time — namely, the period of colonization of the tribal lands of the Kazakh Khanate by the Romanov Empire. This is explained by the fact that the nomadic ruling power remained in Ulytau year-round, periodically placing its residences in the Syr Darya region. Moreover, Ulytau was always a place of refuge for opposition rulers of Mawarannahr, whom the Oghuz, and later the Ak-Orda authority used in their foreign-policy aims.

As for the rest of the population — defined in historical sources as “қара бүтін” (in Turkic) or “қара халық” (in Kazakh) — because they practiced seasonal pasture livestock-breeding, they had no need to build permanent dwellings on summer pastures (zhaylau). They made do with a collapsible, quickly assembled dwelling: the yurt, which replaced the log and mud-brick above-ground houses of Bronze Age inhabitants and made possible the освоение (mastering) of wider spaces of the Great Steppe by increasing the yearly distance of the nomadic cycle. Already in the 7th–6th centuries BCE, the yurt became the main dwelling of nomads. This is evidenced by ancient sources that left information about the yurt as the dwelling of the Saka, the Huns, and others.

Plano Carpini in the 13th century described the yurt as follows: “Their dwellings are round, made like a tent and constructed from twigs and thin poles. At the top, in the middle, there is a round opening from which light falls, and also for the exit of smoke, because in the middle they always have a fire. The walls and roof are covered with felt; the doors are also made of felt… some are quickly dismantled and carried on pack animals; others cannot be dismantled and are transported on carts.” (Margulan A., 2011).

Medieval kystaks in Ulytau have not survived, because raw (sun-dried) brick was used for their construction, and searching for and studying kystaks of that period is not of archaeological interest. Kystaks are destroyed over time in three stages: first, abandoned housing is dismantled for building materials; second, the raw brick is mechanically dissolved in the soil due to long-term precipitation; third, the foundations of the ruins are covered with sand brought by constant winds. On this basis archaeologists determine the type of ruins. The remnants of Ulytau palaces, in the form of mounds, could reach 0.5 to 4 meters in height, while kystaks — no more than 30–40 cm.

In Ulytau, ruins of kystaks from the 19th–20th centuries have survived. The intensive colonization of Kazakh lands by the Russian Empire — expressed in the construction of Cossack military lines, seizure of meadow pastures, and displacement of Kazakh clans into “poorly cultivated” arid lands — led to land crowding in the Ulytau region. Therefore, volost administrators everywhere urged the local population to develop agriculture, and the word “zhatak” became frequently used at that time. The process of partial sedentarization among nomads led to an increase in the pace of building wintering sites, livestock pens, and, along with them, a large number of mosques.

The periodization of the construction and functioning of medieval palaces and settlements in Ulytau can be divided into the Oghuz and Ak-Orda periods. The first period is marked by a flourishing of construction art in the erection of palaces with fortified walls and citadels; the second period is characterized by the building of unfortified settlements with administrative headquarters of regional Chinggisid rulers and the use of palaces inherited from the Oghuz.

Along with permanent year-round residences, seasonal fortifications were built, such as Togyzbaykol. Permanent headquarters functioned both in the Oghuz period and in the Ak-Orda period. This is evidenced by the results of Zhuman Smaïlov’s archaeological excavations at Baskamyr, Ayakkamyr, Aksay, Zhoshy ordasy, and Shotkara.

The economic basis for the emergence of palaces and settlements in Ulytau was a multi-sector economy consisting of nomadic livestock-breeding, metallurgy and crafts, as well as court-based pockets of auxiliary agriculture.

The settlement of the western basin of the Sarysu River was characterized by an annual demographic “breathing”: in April, the riverbeds began to be occupied by numerous auls with flocks and herds, and in late autumn everyone left Ulytau except the miners and metallurgists of Zhezkazgan, as well as the ruling elite, which remained in its fortified castles and settlements.

Harsh natural and climatic conditions, aridity of the soil, and high solar radiation formed nomadism as the economic foundation of life in the Ulytau region, although agriculture can be considered a localized support for livestock-breeding, the development of which is traced in river floodplains and small lakes. This is evidenced by traces of fields of ancient and medieval farmers, and some sources indicate the spread of chigirs (water-lifting devices), whose wide use was possible due to the year-round water-bearing character of certain reaches. A. Margulan provides the following information indicating the presence of a large number of chigirs in the region: “Already in our time we paid attention to a large number of chigirs scattered along the valleys of the rivers Turgay, Zhylandyshyk, Kengir, Sarysu, and others. From the word chigir the river Chigirly-Zhylandyshyk received its name.” (Margulan A., Works, vol. 8, 2011).

In addition to nomadic livestock-breeding and agriculture, metallurgy developed substantially in the region and was an important source of enrichment for the local feudal nobility. Metallurgical products were exported by Central Asian merchants to various countries of Eurasia and made it possible to strengthen and maintain the steppe military force.

The economic basis of the palaces was trade with Central Asian merchants, who in turn were interested in precious and non-ferrous metals, as well as iron and manganese. As the main guiding artery from the urbanized South Kazakhstan into the steppe, the Sarysu River was used.

When the Oghuz cities in Ulytau were built, we can only conjecture. If archaeologists give a precise dating from the 8th to the 10th centuries, the chronicle-based grounding of these cities takes us back to the time of Oghuz Qaghan — that is, to the 2nd century BCE.

The feudal elite of the Oghuz, consisting of the head of state — the khagan-yabghu, his deputies the kül-erkins, and the tribal leaders headed by the sübashï, already in the 7th–8th centuries finally decided to remain in the steppe year-round and for this purpose began to build quite comfortable (for that time) residences on the banks of Ulytau’s mountain rivers. In the basin of the Sarysu River, palaces appeared one after another, fortified with mud-brick walls, with characteristic flanking towers and corners oriented to the four cardinal directions. The south-western wall of the fortified settlements is directed toward Mecca. In such fortresses of Western Saryarka as Ayakkamyr, Baskamyr, Khan ordasy (Aksay), and Dombagul, citadels were built, which proves the fact that these palaces were used year-round. This is evidenced by the presence of ancient traces of fields that provided the inhabitants of the settlements with agricultural produce.

To an outside observer of historical processes in the Great Steppe, it may seem that the absence of large cities on the map is a result of scarce water resources, which led only to limited utilization of steppe resources by nomadic households. If the Turgay plateau is better supplied with water by streams and tributaries of the Tobol and Ishim, then the scarcity of water and grass cover in the Ulytau steppes was compensated by the metallurgical centers of Zhezkazgan, Taldysay, and others.

Along with seasonal pasture livestock-breeding, the Oghuz had a developed urban culture, which in the steppe zone was based on metallurgy. The miners, metallurgists, artisans, and jewelers of Ulyq-Baqyrlıq produced goods that were the primary means of filling the state treasury. Yazdi writes about the cities and kystaks in Ulytau — Kishitau, Ortak, Kertak, Qutlyq-yurt, Uluq-Baqyrlıq — the city of “Great Copper” (Zhezkazgan), Orda-Bazar, Zhar-Kala, Karasu, Uluq-yurt, Oren-saray.